


Slow Burn

by Rainne



Category: Castle
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-06
Updated: 2010-06-13
Packaged: 2018-01-09 02:08:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 35,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1140187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rainne/pseuds/Rainne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’s driving him crazy. In a good way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [secondalto](https://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/gifts).



> For [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), who double dog dared me.

When he made his impulsive offer to let Kate stay in his home – for as long as she needed – he hadn’t really thought through the implications. Granted, there was no way in hell he’d take the invitation back; he’d meant it, sincerely, and he still did. If _as long as she needed_ ended up being six months, a year, or ten years, she could stay there, and he would rejoice at her presence.

Still, there had been consequences, and he really hadn’t thought them through. Most of them were good – having Kate around could be nothing but good for Alexis, especially with his mother now only there sporadically, and she could use some non-crazy influences in her life anyway. How that kid was as level-headed as she was with parents like him and Meredith and a grandmother like Martha was beyond Castle, but he was grateful for it. He wasn’t sure he’d have been able to handle it if she’d turned out like him.

But there was one thing about having Kate there that was driving Castle out of his ever-loving mind.

Since “joining” the police force, Castle had become an early riser; the detectives worked regular shifts (outside of midnight calls to murder scenes), and he liked to be there at eight a.m. with them, right in the thick of everything that was going on. So, for once, it was early to bed and early to rise, and Castle was up at six, shuffling down the hall in his pajamas to go make coffee.

Trouble was, Kate was up at five-thirty, and on the first morning she stayed with him, when he shuffled down the hall at six, she came out of the bathroom in a blast of steam, her skin spangled with droplets of water, wearing nothing more than one of his fluffy blue-and-white striped towels. She passed him with a brief “Morning,” her cheeks red, and she scuttled down the hallway to her room, her feet leaving wet half-moon prints on the hardwood floor.

Castle stared after her, unsure if he was dreaming. Someone somewhere was laughing at him; he could almost hear it.

And it didn’t get any better. There was never anything major, no single incident that he could point to and say _this is why having her here drives me crazy_ ; it was little things like smelling her cherry body wash on the air upstairs, or the sight of her sensible-yet-sexy heels under the end table by the door, or that one time he found a pair of her panties in the dryer.

As the days slowly rolled on, Castle started feeling slightly pressurized. Having her around was great, fabulous, excellent, wonderful, and any other word for “pretty freaking awesome” that his writer’s brain could come up with, but at the same time, it was like being slow roasted over the desert on the seventh circle of hell. He wanted her. He wanted her _badly_.

Then, late one Friday night, about a month or so after she’d started staying there (he was studiously avoiding using the phrase _moved in_ ), he was sitting in his study with his feet up on the desk, studiously working away at his laptop, when the sound of feminine laughter from upstairs shut his brain down completely, sending all the blood in his body rushing southward. “Good night, Alexis,” he heard Kate say, the laughter still bubbling in her voice, and he heard his daughter’s murmured reply just before her bedroom door clicked shut.

Through the half-open door to the study, he saw Kate descend the stairs in a tank top and a pair of safari shorts, her hair down and curling around her shoulders. Her bare feet made no sound as she crossed the living room and entered the kitchen, and he turned his eyes back to his laptop screen when she was out of view, breathing deeply and willing himself to _just calm down_. He had almost managed it when there was a soft knock at his door, and he looked up to see her standing there with a bottle of wine and two glasses. “Drink?”

“Sure.” He saved his work and set the laptop aside. “I’ll come out there.”

“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” she apologized, but he waved her off.

“I was done anyway.” And that was true enough; he’d never get his concentration back now. He followed her out into the living room, waiting for her to curl up on the sofa before taking a seat in the nearby chair, taking the wine bottle as she placed the glasses on the end table. There were her shoes again, those sensible-yet-sexy heels she wore at work, and he smiled slightly at the domesticity as he poured the wine.

She took her glass from him and raised an eyebrow. “What’s that smile for?”

He shrugged. “Just enjoying the company.” He raised his glass. “To us.”

“To good friends,” she replied, giving him that sardonic smile she was so damn good at. She touched her glass to his, and they both drank, her eyes tracking out the window into the city night and his mapping her features slowly, memorizing them for the thousandth time. He could probably draw her from memory, he thought idly, watching the shift and play of muscles bunching and smoothing under her skin.

“Castle,” she said, “you’re staring at me again.”

He smirked. “I’m observing you.”

“You’re annoying me.”

“Ah, but that’s the beauty of it. You like that I annoy you.”

She turned to face him, disbelief all over her face. “Are you serious?”

He grinned. “Of course not. But it’s true, all the same.” He reached out and tugged gently on a lock of her hair. “You even said so.”

She rolled her eyes. “I did, didn’t I? Something must have been wrong with me at the time.”

He laughed. That was one of the best things about being with her; he laughed so much, and it was always real. And she laughed, too, when he did. He poured them both more wine, and she asked about the book.

From the book they moved on to the renovations on her apartment (which hadn’t actually started yet because she was getting a bunch of grief out of the insurance company), and then to the last case, and from there to a movie that had just come out, which both of them wanted to see. When the clock in his office chimed two a.m., he raised the bottle again only to realize, with a dim feeling of surprise, that it was empty. “When did we finish the bottle?”

She regarded the item in his hand lazily. “I dunno,” she murmured. Then she stood. “But if there’s no more alcohol, I guess that means it must be time for bed.” She stretched, her arms reaching for the ceiling and her head tilting backward, and his eyes were drawn to the clean lines of her body and the flat, silky plane of her abdomen as it peeked out from under the hem of her tank top.

He felt a distant, rhythmic thudding that might have been his heart, or might have been the warning drums from the back of his brain trying to tell him that this was a very bad idea, and this could end very badly, and he should stop. He ignored both, and he stood up, reaching out to rest one hand very gently on her hip as she lowered her arms.

Her eyes opened wide in surprise and she looked up at him, and he saw the question die on her lips as her eyes met his. He reached up with his other hand and brushed her hair back out of her face, studying her carefully for any sign that she was about to either panic or kick him in the balls. When she did neither, he allowed his fingers to trail down the side of her face, his thumb brushing feather-light against the plumpness of her lower lip. “Kate,” he said softly, “I really would like to kiss you right now.”

She swallowed. “Is that a fact?”

He felt one corner of his mouth twitch up in amusement. “Why, yes, it is.” He continued to stroke that warm flesh, delicate as though he were touching a spiderweb. “I want to kiss you. I want to hold you. I want to take you out to dinner and dancing. I want to take you to Europe.” He paused, studying her eyes. “I want to take you to bed.”

Her hands came up slowly to rest on his chest, and for a moment, he was afraid she was going to push him away. But she didn’t; instead, she ran them back down his abdomen and rested them on his hips. “Why don’t we start with the kiss,” she suggested, “and see what happens from there?”

He grinned. “That sounds like a good plan.” He moved his hand very slightly, cupping the side of her face, and he leaned down slowly, giving her plenty of time to change her mind. Her eyes fluttered closed as his lips brushed softly against hers once, and then again, and then again. On the third pass, her lips parted very slightly, and he heard her make a soft sound of invitation in the back of her throat. He kissed her again, more firmly this time, and when her lips parted farther he reached out to delicately trace the edge of the bottom one with his tongue.

He could taste the wine in her mouth when he finally delved inside, and the scent of cherries filled his nose as her fingers gripped his hips more tightly. He didn’t move, didn’t pull her closer, just stood there holding her loosely and kissing her until neither one of them could breathe. When he finally released her lips, she was panting for breath, her eyes still closed. He could feel the warm wash of her exhalations on his cheek, and he leaned down again, pressing his lips this time to her chin and moving slowly up her jawline toward her ear.

Her head fell back, her neck arching temptingly, and he responded, burying his nose behind her ear and first licking, then nipping softly at the lobe. She whimpered, and he chuckled, and her hands pulled him closer to her. “Castle,” she whispered.

He nipped her earlobe again. “Rick,” he corrected her.

“Rick,” she repeated, her fingers gripping his belt loops, and then, when he moved downward to nuzzle at the crook of her neck, “God…”

He didn’t move any farther than her shoulder; when she shuddered against him, he slipped back upward to taste her mouth again, and this time, she moaned softly into his. “Please,” she whispered when he released her, and he nuzzled her face with his.

“Please, what?”

Her hands slid up his body, clutching at his shoulders, and she opened her eyes to stare into his. “Take me to bed.”

He was more than happy to oblige, and he shifted slightly, leaning down to lift her off her feet. She gasped in surprise, clutching at him for a moment, and then she relaxed, wrapping her legs around his waist and draping her arms across his shoulders. She leaned down and kissed him again, and they both laughed as he wavered and nearly dropped her. She hit the light switch as they passed it on the way up the stairs, casting the living room into darkness, and she bit her lip as they passed Alexis’s closed door.

He set her on her feet just inside the door of his bedroom, and turned to face her in the dim light. “Kate,” he said softly, cupping her face with his hand. “Are you sure? You’re not going to change your mind in the morning and decide this was a terrible idea and I must have taken advantage of you in your inebriated state?”

She chuckled softly. “No. I’m not going to change my mind.” She tiptoed and kissed him again, hard. “Shut the door, Rick.”

He shut the door. Then he stepped forward, his hands going to her hips again, and he slipped his fingers under the hem of her shirt, skimming it upward and off over her head. He bent down to mouth at the crook of her neck again, and then he slowly dropped to his knees before her, pressing a gentle kiss to the flat plane of her belly. The scent of cherries filled his nose as her fingers threaded gently into his hair, and as he tugged her shorts down her legs, the scent of her arousal overpowered that of the fruits. He ran his hands up her legs to her hips, then stood and bent to kiss her again, backing her slowly against the bed.

He laid her backward, reaching down and resting one hand on her sternum, his fingers brushing the front clasp of her bra. “Last chance to back out,” he murmured.

In response, she reached up and flicked the clasp of the bra, letting the fabric fall to the side and exposing her breasts to him. “I’m not backing out,” she replied. She reached up and touched his face with gentle fingers. “I want you to make love to me, Rick.”

He turned his face slightly and kissed her palm. “Kate, you have no idea how long I’ve wanted to hear you say that.”

He leaned down again and kissed her, slow and sweet, and this time when he left her mouth, he made his way slowly down her neck and across her collarbone before swooping down to pay slow, skillful homage to her breasts. She arched up to him, writhing against him, and he slid his hands under her back, spreading his fingers out wide as though trying to touch all of her at once. He trekked across her ribcage, finding areas that made her giggle and sigh and squeak, and when he arrived at her navel, he traced a circle around it with his tongue before sliding it into that sweet indention.

Kate gasped aloud, then moaned low in her throat as he pressed in, thrusting with his tongue in a parody of what the rest of him wanted so badly. Her fingers threaded through his hair, kneading his scalp, and she whispered his name into the air around them. He nipped at her flesh and she squeaked, then he soothed the spot with his tongue and she sighed. And when his hands moved to her waist, his fingers slipping under the elastic of her panties, she raised her hips so that he could slide them off and drop them onto the floor.

His head spun as he took in the sight before him: Kate Beckett, gloriously nude on his bed, her hair spread out like a halo and her eyes gone dark with desire. “God,” he whispered. “You are so beautiful.”

The blush started near her stomach and traveled up to her cheeks. “I’m also feeling a little underdressed,” she teased to hide her embarrassment. She sat up, reaching for his shirt tails and tugging on them. “How about you lose this, hmm?”

He complied willingly, shrugging out of the shirt and toeing his shoes off at the same time. His socks followed, but she batted his hands out of the way when he reached for his belt. “Uh-uh,” she said, resting her fingers on the buckle. “Mine.” Her right hand slid downward, finding his straining erection under the fabric and squeezing it gently.

He groaned. “Jesus, Kate.”

She laughed low in her throat and popped the button on his pants, drawing the zipper down slowly, her eyes on his the whole time. She tucked her fingers under the elastic of his boxers and drew them and his pants down, dropping them on the floor and letting him step out of them as her eyes trailed down his body.

She paused, her eyes widening. “Christ, Castle, where the hell have you been hiding that thing?”

He laughed. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Her hand came up again to wrap around his flesh and she licked her lips, but he touched her shoulder, laying her back on the bed, grinning when she pouted slightly. “Kate… I have to be completely honest with you about something.”

She raised one eyebrow. “Is now really the time?”

“For this? Yes.” He kissed her lips softly. “I know where you were going with that, and as much as I would very much love for that to happen – and eventually, it will – if you do that, I’m gonna go off like a bottle rocket and this evening will be over before it even gets started.” He grinned into her eyes. “And I’d hate to disappoint you like that.”

She chuckled. “Fine,” she said dramatically, in a long-suffering tone. “If that’s how it has to be.”

“That is definitely how it has to be,” he said, leaning to kiss under her jaw again. “So you just lie back, and let me make tonight perfect for you. Okay?”

She swallowed hard, emotion written all over her face, and he grinned, making his slow, careful way back down her body. By the time he made it back down to her navel, she was gasping again, and when he parted her legs to run his hands up the tender flesh of her inner thighs, she arched under his touch. “Rick,” she moaned softly, and he smiled, leaning to press a kiss to the lower curve of her belly.

“Just relax,” he whispered against her flesh. “Let me make you fly.”

“Please,” she whispered, her eyes fluttering closed and her hands fisting in the comforter at the first confident touch of his tongue. “God, Rick, please.”

A moment later she lost the capacity for speech, and was able only to whimper and cry out as his mouth did things to her that she would swear were illegal in four states. His tongue lashed at her, his teeth nipping and pulling, and she writhed in his grip, grinding against him and making incoherent sounds of pleasure, higher and higher in pitch until suddenly she was flying, shattering in his hands as a thousand suns went supernova behind her eyes. Then she was falling, crashing back to earth as he raised himself above her and nuzzled at her ear, his arms around her shoulders and his body covering hers warmly.

“Jesus,” she whispered when she was able to speak again. She released her death grip on the comforter, raising her arms to wrap them around his torso. “Jesus Christ.”

He laughed softly into her ear. “No,” he contradicted as he shifted and slid inside her. “Only me.”

She opened her mouth as though to speak, but before she could, he pulled back and pushed back in again, and the only sound she made was one of incoherent pleasure. He leaned down to kiss her slightly-open mouth, nipping at her tongue when it extended slightly into his mouth. She reached up then, taking firm hold of his head, and she pulled him down into a hot, carnal kiss. “Castle,” she whispered into his mouth. “Fuck me.”

So he did. He pulled out all the stops, used every trick he knew and some he made up on the spot, setting as his ultimate goal her ultimate pleasure. He made her come crying out, and then he made her come screaming, before he finally bowed his head against hers and spilled inside her, breathing her name against her skin.

He rolled to the side, breathing hard, and pulled her against him, letting her sprawl half across him, her head on his shoulder and her arm across his chest, and he stroked her sweaty back with his fingers. “God,” he whispered into the air. “You’re amazing.”

She looked up at him with one eyebrow raised, her tone sardonic even as her fingers stroked his chest. “Isn’t that supposed to be my line?”

He smiled. “Well, you’re free to plagiarize it, if you like. I don’t mind, as long as it’s true.”

“It’s true,” she said softly, snuggling tightly against him. “Castle…”

“Rick,” he corrected her again.

She chuckled softly. “Hard habit to break,” she admitted. “Cut me some slack.”

He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to the top of her head. “As much as you need,” he said sincerely. “Whatever you need. Kate…” He looked down at her, tucking one fingertip under her chin and drawing her up to meet his eyes. “I mean that. _Anything_ that you need.”

She raised one eyebrow. “What if I need…a beach?”

“Trip to the beach. You got it. Florida, California or Saint-Tropez?”

“No, no, not a _trip_ to the beach. A _beach_. Like, my own private beach.” She rolled slightly, resting her chin on his pectoral. “Maybe a little island in the Caribbean?”

“Hmm.” He pretended to consider. “An island is really more of a want than a need, but – _ow_!” He jumped when she gave a tug on his chest hair. “I’m sure we can work something out; there’s no need to get violent!”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), who enables me.

He had been dreaming of cherries; actually, of walking in a grove of cherry trees and having the blossoms falling all over him, brushing across his face with gentle, silken touches. When he was finally able to convince his unwilling eyes to open, Castle found that those so-soft touches had been her hair, stirring in the gentle breeze of his breath, and the scent itself clung, of course, to her skin. She had fallen asleep with her head on his shoulder and her arm across his chest; at some point in the night, they had moved together and he was now spooned up against her back, holding her tightly against his body.

Oh, to wake up every morning just like this.

He moved slowly, so as not to wake her, slipping out of the bed and padding to the bathroom. Once necessity had been attended to, he brushed his teeth before pulling on his pajama pants and a tee shirt. He paused as he passed the bed to brush a kiss against her forehead, and she mumbled something in her sleep before burrowing more deeply into the pillow – something that could have been his name.

He was smiling as he descended the stairs, his goal the coffee pot, but he was brought up short by the sight of his daughter sitting at the kitchen counter, glaring in his direction. “Bad morning, Strawberry?”

“You are going to have to raise my allowance. Now.”

He raised an eyebrow as he moved toward the coffee pot, which was already full of aromatic liquid. “And I must do this because…?”

“Because it’s going to be very expensive for me to have my bedroom soundproofed,” she replied, glowering. She stood, picking up her purse. “I am going to go spend the day with Taylor. We are going shopping, because I need retail therapy to _attempt_ to erase from my traumatized memory all the _noise_ you two were making last night.” She paused. “I have my cell phone.”

“Try not to beggar me, will you?” He poured two cups of coffee. “The new book won’t be out for awhile.”

She grinned. “Okay. Bye, Dad.” She waved as she bounced out the door, and Castle smiled slightly, watching her go. She really was a good kid. He turned his attention back to breakfast, quickly assembling bagels, juice and coffee on a tray before heading back upstairs, humming under his breath. He entered the room, still humming, with a flourish, turning toward the bed only to pause in consternation when he found it empty.

He set the tray down on the bedside table, pushing the lamp out of the way, and moved toward the bathroom, the sound of running water telling him where his missing detective could be found.

She was standing at the sink, wearing one of his shirts with the sleeves rolled partway up, splashing water onto her face. He walked up behind her, pulling a towel off the rack and putting it into her reaching hand before resting his hands on her shoulders and bending to kiss the back of her neck. “Good morning.”

She patted her face dry, took a deep breath, and turned to face him. “Castle…”

He raised an eyebrow. “You said you weren’t going to do this.”

She paused. “I’m not.” She swallowed. “But I need to ask you something. Something important.”

“Okay,” he said, studying her face. She looked deathly serious, and maybe a little pale, and he reached up to touch her face. “What’s wrong, Kate?”

She bit her lip. “Are you… I mean, can you… you haven’t…” She swallowed again. “God. How do I even say this?”

“Just say it. Whatever you need to know, you can ask, and I’ll tell you. No secrets.”

She nodded, running a hand through her hair. “After Alexis, did you ever… have you had…” He watched her in confusion, totally flummoxed, and she finally burst out, “Have you ever had a vasectomy?”

He stared at her. “What? Of course not. Why would I do that?”

“Oh, jeez.” She turned, sitting down on the edge of the tub and putting her face in her hands. “Oh, no.”

He watched her in confusion for another couple of seconds before the light suddenly went on in his mind. “Oh – _oh_. Oh, hell.” He moved to sit down beside her and reached for her, unsure if she would let him hold her or if she would pull away. He was relieved when she leaned into him and he held her tightly. “Kate, listen, whatever happens, you know you won’t be alone, right?”

She was still for a long moment before she finally nodded, her hands dropping into her lap. “I know,” she whispered.

He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I’ll take care of you,” he murmured into her hair. “I promise.”

She took a deep breath and lifted her hands, wrapping them around his waist. “I wouldn’t _mind_ , I don’t think. If… if I am. I mean… I always wanted to… I just… I wasn’t really planning… you know, now’s just not a good time.”

He laughed. “It’s never a good time. And when Alexis first came along, I was _terrified_. But it’ll be okay.”

She sighed. “The guys will never let me hear the end of it.”

Castle laughed. “That’s true.” He held her tightly. “Try not to worry, okay?”

She took another deep breath. “I’ll try. Doubt I’ll be very successful, though.”

He grinned, running his hand down her back. “Then let me take your mind off things.”

She raised her head to look at him and he captured her lips in a slow, sensuous kiss that left her gasping for breath. “Castle, we –”

“ _Rick_ ,” he corrected her, his other hand dropping to her leg and then sliding up toward her hip. He nibbled at her bottom lip, and her eyes fluttered closed, her breath washing warm across his face.

“Rick,” she whispered. “We can’t.”

“Sure we can,” he replied, moving down toward the hotspot on her neck he’d discovered the previous night. “I’ve got protection, and I’ll remember to use it this time.”

“No, I mean…” her voice trailed off as he did something obscene with his tongue, and she shuddered hard in his arms. “Alexis will –”

“Alexis is gone for the day,” he replied, pushing the neck of his shirt out of the way so he could taste her shoulder. “And even if she was here, she wouldn’t hear anything she didn’t hear last night.”

Kate’s eyes opened wide. “She _heard_?”

Rick laughed. “You weren’t quiet, Kate. She heard. Advised me this morning that I’ll be paying to soundproof her bedroom.” He chuckled, his hand coming up to flick open the buttons of the shirt she wore. “You look absolutely delectable in my shirt, by the way. You should wear nothing but my shirts all the time.”

“Make it hard to catch bad guys,” Kate replied dryly.

His hand slid inside to cup her breast. “But easy access.”

By the time they got around to the coffee and bagels, the coffee was cold and the bagels were stale.

They spent most of the day in bed, venturing downstairs only occasionally for food, talking and dozing and laughing and making love. As the sun was setting over the city, Castle declared that dinner was in order; Alexis would be home soon, and they really did need to eat something substantial. They rose and dressed, and when the front door opened to admit his daughter and her purchases, Rick was standing at the stove sautéing onions while Kate sat at the counter with a glass of wine, dicing tomatoes.

“Hi, Dad. Hi, Kate.” Alexis pushed the door shut behind her, dropping three bags on the sofa. “What’s for dinner?”

“Chicken farfalle,” Rick replied, pointing at the bowl of freshly drained pasta. “Hope you’re hungry.”

“Starved,” the girl replied, hopping up onto the barstool next to Kate. “Taylor dragged me up and down Fifth Avenue.”

“Should I have the paramedics on hand when the MasterCard bill arrives?”

“Of course not. I used your American Express.” Alexis filched a crumble of goat cheese out of a bowl on the counter. “Besides, everything was on sale, and I didn’t buy anything really expensive.”

“You never do,” Rick replied, removing the onions from the heat. “Which is why I trust you outside of my sight with more than two credit cards.”

Alexis rolled her eyes in Kate’s direction. “It’s so hard being the responsible one in this relationship.”

“Tell me about it,” Kate replied, grinning, while Castle affected to look wounded.

“Anyway.” Alexis waved a hand. “Taylor said I can come over and spend the night tonight if I need to.” She eyed her father. “Am I going to need to?”

Kate’s face went bright red, her eyes shifting wildly as though looking for an escape route. Rick opened his mouth to reply and then closed it again. “Can’t say that, it’s incredibly inappropriate.” He gave his daughter stare for stare. “Got it all out of your system now?”

Alexis tilted her head and studied him for a long moment, then looked over at Kate, taking in the deep blush and expression of discomfort on the detective’s face. “Yeah,” she said softly. “Sorry.”

Kate shook her head. “No, I’m… sorry we woke you last night.”

“No, it’s okay, really,” Alexis began, and Rick raised a hand to stop the avalanche of overlapping apologies that he could see coming.

“Okay. Everyone’s sorry. Good. How about dinner?”

Alexis retreated to her room after the meal and Rick, after lighting a fire, moved over to the couch, drawing Kate with him. He sat and pulled her down next to him, holding her close for a long moment, his temple resting on the top of her head. “How long before you’ll know?” he asked softly.

“I’m due in a week,” she said after a moment’s thought, her own voice soft. “If I don’t start, I can test after that.”

He nodded, squeezing her gently. “I’m sorry.”

She glanced up at him. “What for?”

“I should have remembered. I’m usually not that careless.” He sighed. “I’m sorry for giving you something else to have to worry about.”

“I’m not worried.”

“You’re not?”

She grinned. “Are you kidding? I could retire from the force on the child support payments alone.”

He choked on a laugh and leaned down to kiss her breathless. “That,” he said when he released her lips, “is exactly the kind of attitude that will get you far in society.” He pulled her onto his lap, putting his feet up on the coffee table and holding her close. His hand rubbed her back soothingly as they stared into the fire, neither feeling the need to talk but simply existing together in that time and space.

Around midnight, Alexis peeked out of her room to find the two of them still there, asleep. She shut the main light off and went to bed, smiling.

It was Martha who woke them the next morning, breezing in without even buzzing and dropping her purse loudly on the living room floor in surprise when she saw them. “Well, good morning!” she exclaimed as the two of them jumped.

Castle’s quick reflexes were all that kept Kate from an unceremonious meeting with the floor, and he glared up at his mother. “Don’t you knock?”

“Sorry, darling,” Martha replied, but it was more to Kate that she spoke than to Castle. “I was just so surprised! But I’m glad to see you’ve both finally come to your senses. I was beginning to worry that I might have to lock you in a closet together.” With that, she sailed upstairs, leaving Kate and Rick alone in the living room.

They studied one another, and finally Rick spoke. “How’d you like to spend the day out somewhere?”

“I’ll go get a shower.”

“I’ll come with you.”

She laughed low in her throat as he followed her toward the stairs. “If you get in the shower with me, we won’t go anywhere until after noon.”

“And this is a problem how?” He reached out to run a hand up her leg as they arrived at the upper floor and she spun away from him, dancing back just a few steps with a teasing grin on her face. “Oh,” he breathed, mindful of his mother and his daughter somewhere within earshot. “Katie wants to play.”

Her eyes sparkled at him as she caught her lower lip between her teeth, the side of her mouth still quirked up in that smile, and she moved backward, matching him step for step as he advanced. He lunged and she shrieked, spinning and taking off at a run. Laughing, he followed, catching her in the back by the bedroom she’d been staying in. He wrapped his arms around her waist and hoisted her up, tossing her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry and heading toward his bedroom while she whacked at his back and demanded to be put down. He did so once they were in his room, pushing the door shut and backing her against it. He planted one hand on either side of her head and leaned down, kissing her warm and slow until she was gasping for breath, her hands clenched in the material of his shirt. He slid his own hands under hers, lifting it up and off over her head as she gasped for breath.

Minutes later they were both naked, and he was lifting her up and pressing her against the shower wall. She made a strangled noise when her bare back came into contact with the cold tile, but it warmed quickly enough and there were other considerations, like his erection – prudently sheathed – sliding inside her body, that took her mind off the momentary chill. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, her fingers sliding into his wet hair and pulling him close so that she could kiss him hard before burying her face in the side of his neck as he planted his feet and thrust hard again and again and again until she arched, her body shuddering and her fingers clenching, her nails digging into his shoulders and back as she came with his name on her lips. When he followed her into bliss, his knees nearly buckled, and they laughed as he staggered, nearly slipping on the wet floor.

“You drop me in here, Castle, I’m gonna break an arm. How are you gonna explain that at the precinct?” she asked as he set her back on her feet and dealt with the condom.

He grinned. “With a lot of pride. And a black eye that I’m sure you’ll give me with your non-broken arm.” He kissed her again before she stepped backward into the spray, then watched appreciatively as the water rolled down her body. “God, you’re beautiful. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of saying that.”

She blushed, as she always did when he complimented her. “You’re not so bad yourself, you know,” she pointed out as he climbed back into the shower with her.

He turned her, pulling her close to rest with her back against his chest. His hand came down to rest on her stomach. “And someday,” he murmured, “whether it’s now or later, you and I are going to make beautiful babies.” He pressed a kiss to her shoulder. “That’s a promise.”

She turned in his arms just enough to kiss him, and then she offered him the bar of soap. “I believe, Mr. Castle, that you promised me a day out.”

“Why, so I did,” he replied, lathering up his hands and setting them on her shoulder blades. “But first, I think I’d like to wash your back. If you don’t mind.”

“Not a bit.” She smiled as his hands slid over her skin.

Sometime later, with stealth that would have made a ninja proud, they slipped out of the apartment unnoticed and scampered, hand in hand, down to the elevator. When they emerged from the building into the sunlight, Rick slung an arm over Kate’s shoulder and held her close to him as they walked. She, in turn, wrapped her arm around his waist, and fought but couldn’t defeat the silly smile that spread across her face.

“So,” he said as they merged into the sea of people on the street. “Where would you like to go?”

“Anywhere,” she told him, smiling up at him.

“Anywhere it is,” he replied, turning toward the street. A cab’s horn blared as he led her out onto the asphalt.

“Castle, this isn’t a crosswalk.”


	3. Discovery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More smut. More plot. Author seen to scratch head in confusion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), who has created a monster.

Rick Castle rolled over early Monday morning, he found his new girlfriend sitting up in bed, studying him with a serious expression of a type he didn’t think he’d ever seen before. He’d seen Kate Beckett serious in a number of situations; there was “questioning a suspect” serious, there was “going in with guns drawn” serious, and there was even “if you leave the toilet seat up and I fall in one more time” serious. This, though, was not a serious he had a label for, and he raised up on one elbow to study her in return.

“What’s wrong?” he finally asked.

She bit her lip. “If I say I don’t want the whole precinct to know about this yet, are you gonna get your feelings hurt?”

He smiled slightly. “No.”

“Good, because I don’t. Want the whole precinct to know, that is.”

He nodded. “That’s fine.”

She sighed. “I’ll have to tell Captain Montgomery. Although he probably thinks we’ve been together for ages. He gives me these _looks_ sometimes. Like he thinks I’m trying to fool him.”

“Well, if you need me to, I’ll back you up.”

She shrugged. “Probably not. But he needs to know, anyway.”

“Ryan and Esposito?”

“No.” She shook her head. “I’m not ready for the jokes just yet.” She reached down and ran a finger across his cheekbone. “I think I want to keep you all to myself. Just for a little while.”

The smile returned to his face and he rested a hand on her sheet-covered thigh. “Whatever you want to do.”

She nodded, then leaned down to kiss him briefly before sliding out of bed and heading, stark naked, for the bathroom. He watched her go, admiring the view, but he had to laugh when she paused and glanced back at him over her shoulder. “You comin’, or what?”

“How could I possibly resist an invitation like that?” He rolled out of bed and followed her.

It was still dark outside. Rather than put on the light, Rick dug under the cabinet and pulled out several candles which, judging by the dust on them, had been there for some time. He wiped the dust off and lit them, handing them to Kate, who placed them around the room, lighting the area just enough that they could see. The light was low enough that when he looked at her, her eyes were the fathomless black of the night sky and her hair fell across her shoulders like a sheet of obsidian. The shadows rose behind her like the wings of a fallen angel, flickering and dancing with the candle flames.

He reached down and started the water, flicking the shower on and letting the room begin to fill with humid warmth, and then he drew her into his arms and held her close for a very long time, just reveling in the touch of her skin and the warm brush of her breath across his chest. Finally, though, she released him and stepped into the tub, drawing him behind her with a wicked smile on her face.

The shower was rapidly becoming one of his favorite places to make love to her. There was something about holding her body, naked and wet, against his own, letting the water beat down on both of them, touching her skin with soap-slicked hands, or even having her lean against him, her cheek against his chest and her arms around his waist, while he washed her hair. Those were some of the very few times when he felt her let her guard down, when she felt safe enough to let go and let him be the strong one for a minute.

He was certainly capable of being the strong one – despite his outward displays of immaturity and childishness, he had after all been a single father to Alexis for more than a dozen years. But being strong was part of who Kate was. She didn’t want a man to protect her; she was more than capable of protecting herself. She might enjoy being taken care of once in awhile, pampered like a princess, coddled and spoiled, but she stood on her own two feet once those moments were over, her sword in her hand and her shield on her hip.

But there, in the dim light, with liquid heat pouring down on them and his hands and his mouth on her skin, she was able to step aside and let him take over, let him hold her and touch her with all the reverence and adoration he had for her. So he waited for that moment, waited to feel her relax against him with a tiny sigh of contentment, and he lowered his lips to her shoulder.

His kisses trailed slowly up her neck to that place behind her ear that he’d discovered made her so hot, and her arms wrapped around his shoulders, her fingers sliding into his wet hair. “Rick,” she whispered, shuddering against him, and he grinned, licking her there again. His hands slid from her shoulder blades down to her waist and then to her ass, gripping and squeezing gently as he’d wanted to since the first time he saw it, encased in sturdy blue denim.

“Kate,” he whispered back, letting his tongue tease her earlobe. She writhed against him and he groaned when her movement trapped his erection between their bodies. “Jesus.”

She laughed softly, her own mouth moving now, her hand cupping his jaw as she kissed her way down his neck and across his chest, blazing a slow oral trail as she sank to her knees before him. She caressed his cock for a long moment, her eyes locked onto his, and then, without releasing his gaze, she leaned forward and took him in her mouth.

He groaned low in his chest, wanting to close his eyes and revel in the sensations but unable to tear himself away from the sight. He chose instead to rest his hands on top of her head, his fingers twining into her hair. “Oh, God, Kate,” he whispered, and she chuckled around his flesh. One of her hands was braced against his thigh; the other was cupping his balls, rolling them gently on her palm. He struggled to hold himself still, to keep from thrusting into that hot, sweet suction, and he whispered her name again.

She released him suddenly, leaning down and pressing the flat of her tongue against the base of his shaft, then licking him slowly all the way up to the crown before taking just the head in and lavishing it with a slow, decadent kiss. Then she took him inside again, taking as much of him in as she could, and he gasped when he felt his tip touch the back of her throat before she slid backward again. “Kate,” he groaned. “Kate, I’m gonna…”

She hummed softly, sliding forward to take him in deep again and squeezing his balls gently, and he cried out, coming so hard that he saw stars. When he was able to breathe again, she was standing up, letting the water rinse her clean and smirking at him. He pulled her close, burying his hands in her hair and kissing her hard. Then he turned the tables on her, leaning her back against the wall as he began to make his way down her body.

She was panting long before he reached her navel, and when his fingers parted her flesh she was soaked with more than just the water. Without a word, he lifted one of her legs over his shoulder, slid two fingers inside her body and applied his mouth to her clit. She wailed, her fingers clawing at the tile, and he reveled in the tensing of her thighs and the grasping of her channel. Thrusting slowly with his fingers, he lapped at her, using the rough flat of his tongue to rub her the way he knew she liked. She whimpered and mewled, her hips rolling against his face, and she called out his name when she came. He held her up until she got the use of her legs back, then he shut the water off and drew her out of the tub.

He patted her dry with a towel, gave himself a cursory buff, and then wrapped the towel around her body, using it to pull her back into the bedroom and onto the bed. He dropped it on the floor, turned back to her, and raised himself over her body, his knees on either side of her waist. As he moved upward, he dropped kisses on her soft skin, whispering endearments against that silken warmth, and when he reached her ear, he whispered, “Turn over.”

She complied with a soft moan, and he took a long few moments to run his hands up and down her back, kissing her spine softly before urging up onto her knees. He was hard again and aching for her, and when she rolled her hips back against him, he bit his lip. He leaned, reaching into the bedside table and pulling a condom out of the drawer. Once it was on, he slid his hands under her body, reaching up to cup her breasts as he slid home inside her.

He held still for a long moment, holding her close and listening to the soft sounds of pleasure she made every time she breathed. “God, Kate,” he whispered against her back. “I – oh, God, Kate.” Biting down hard on his lip to keep the words he’d almost said from spilling out, he started to thrust slowly, pushing as deep inside her as he could. She writhed underneath him, pushing her hips back every time he moved forward, her hands clenching in the sheets. With each meeting of their bodies, she made a high-pitched sound that wrapped around his brain, making him want to hear it again and again.

He pushed into her harder and harder, deeper and deeper, until she arched beneath him and cried out, her inner muscles gripping him deliciously through her climax. He pushed in, reveling in the sensations, his mind spinning as he came deep inside her.

After dealing with the condom, he lay next to her and she sprawled across him in her usual position, one arm across his chest and her head on his shoulder. They were silent for a long time, then she took a deep breath and blew it out in a cool stream across his chest. “Wow.” He chuckled, running his fingers through her still-damp hair, but his hand stilled when she spoke again. “I could… really get used to this,” she murmured, her voice barely more than a whisper.

“I hope you do,” he replied, his voice equally quiet. He stroked her hair back out of her eyes when she looked up at him. “I mean it. I…” He paused, and let his eyes do the speaking for him. “I do.”

She settled against him again, her fingers combing through his chest hair. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

She was silent for another long moment, obviously gathering her thoughts, and then she finally spoke again. “I need to know… that this isn’t just a game to you. That you’re not just… notching your bedpost. That this whole… everything hasn’t just been about… getting me to sleep with you.” Her hand flattened against his chest when he drew breath to answer. She didn’t look up at him, but he didn’t need her to; he could visualize her expression well enough. “I’m not… I just… I need to not wonder.”

He tucked one finger under her chin, drawing her face up to look at him. Her eyes were wet, and her face was pleading with him to understand why she was asking a question that might send another man – a man who did not know Kate Beckett the way he did – into a rage. He smiled slightly, running his thumb under one eye to brush the tears away. “No, Kate,” he said softly. “This isn’t a game. And you could never be just a notch on my bedpost.”

She closed her eyes, her teeth sinking down into her bottom lip, and she nodded once, laying her forehead down against his chest. He held her tightly while her shoulders shook, stroking her back and whispering soothing nonsense against the crown of her head. He continued long after she’d stopped crying, long after she’d dozed off. When she woke up again, he hadn’t stopped.

When they stepped off the elevator around eight, they were focusing too tightly on each other, and the argument they were having over the right way to cook a grilled cheese sandwich, to notice that everyone else in the room suddenly had somewhere to be that wasn’t there. Even Ryan and Esposito ducked into the break room when they saw Castle and Beckett coming, but Kate was defending her preference for sliced American cheese product (“It’s classic, Castle.” “It’s disgusting, Beckett.”) to notice. She got all the way to her desk and was dropping her bag into her drawer when she realized that her companion was no longer dogging her steps; he had instead stopped still about halfway into the room, and was staring at something.

“Castle?”

He didn’t speak, simply swallowed and nodded his head to her right. She turned, blinked, and felt herself go pale. Taped to the murder board, which had been wiped clean after the close of the last case, was a poster-sized snapshot of herself and Castle. She dimly recognized the setting – they were standing outside a little deli around the corner from his loft. She was carrying the sandwiches and chips they had just picked up for a picnic lunch. And she was wrapped in his arms, her eyes closed in obvious bliss as he kissed her thoroughly.

She felt the urge to kill rising inside her and she began to turn in a slow circle, looking for the guilty face of the culprit. Someone was going to pay for this. Her eyes crossed Castle’s face and, just for a moment, she wondered. She immediately put the speculation aside, though; his shock upon seeing the picture had been too real and, while he might occasionally go a little over the line, he would not have done this. She had been too clear about her desire for privacy on this issue and, after what had happened with his investigation of her mother’s case, she didn’t think he was likely to ignore such a request from her again.

Then she saw them. Just for a second, Ryan and Esposito, both hiding behind the espresso machine in the break room, peeked up and out the window. “You,” she breathed. The two men glanced at one another and then broke, one going one direction and one going another. She reached for Esposito, who was closer, but he dodged past and Castle caught her, giving Esposito a chance to escape. “Let me go, Castle,” she snarled. “There’s about to be a murder.”

“Let him go, Kate.” He held her tightly by the shoulders – and really, how had she never noticed before how strong he was? – and he stared down into her eyes. “Let him go. They’re just trying to be funny.” He steered her toward her chair and made her sit down, then stepped over to the board and pulled the picture down, balling it up and tossing it into a nearby trash can. He looked around the room, noting that everyone else was carefully keeping their distance, eyes averted, and caught a glimpse of Ryan, peeking around a door frame. “Ryan. Where did you get that?”

Coming forward (but not too close as Kate had turned to glare daggers at him), Ryan shrugged and leaned against the doorway. “Buddy of Esposito’s from the 19th saw you guys out, texted him, he texted me, we did a little recon.”

“And you thought _this_ was –”

Castle reached out and touched Kate’s shoulder gently, and she stopped talking, clamping her lips shut on whatever else it was she had intended to say. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose, then stood and strode into the break room, slamming coffee cans and creamer bottles around.

Esposito made his reappearance, sliding into the room to stand next to Ryan. “She… really didn’t take that as well as we expected.”

“She wanted to keep it private for awhile,” Castle replied.

Ryan and Esposito exchanged a glance. “Oops,” Esposito said.

Castle made a wry face. He turned, looking through the window into the break room. Kate was standing at the opposite wall, staring out the window, fury in every line of her body. He briefly contemplated going to her and decided not to; she needed a few minutes to settle down. Instead, he moved in the other direction, sticking his head into Montgomery’s office. “Hey.”

Montgomery looked up and greeted him in a tone that said he’d been expecting this. “Castle.”

“You saw the picture.” When the captain merely nodded, Castle continued, “She was going to tell you this morning.”

Montgomery studied him for a moment. “Just tell me how long it’s been going on.”

“Since Friday.” At Montgomery’s skeptical look, Rick held his hands out. “I swear to you. Friday.”

“It’s the truth.” Kate’s voice came from behind Rick, and he stepped to the side to let her enter the room. She pushed the door shut behind herself and folded her arms. “He’s telling the truth.”

Montgomery studied them both for a very long moment, and then sighed. “Damn. Do you know what this means, Beckett?”

Beckett raised an eyebrow. “Sir?”

The captain shook his head, pulling a sheet of notepaper out of his drawer and consulting it. “It means Karpowski won the pool. The two of you couldn’t have held out for two more weeks? You just cost me a hundred bucks.”

There was a long moment of silence before Beckett wordlessly opened the door, stepped out into the bullpen, and shut the door again, very quietly. Castle watched her cross the room, step through a doorway and go down the hall toward the fire escape. When she disappeared from view, he turned back to Montgomery. “Maybe there’ll be a murder.” Then he, too, stepped out.

When Kate returned ten minutes later, calmer, there were bloody scrapes on the knuckles of her right hand. Castle retrieved the first aid kit from the break room and tended them wordlessly, and then he sat beside her while she did paperwork, not speaking, but occasionally glancing up, silently daring anyone to approach her.

It was almost noon when the call came in, and he thought she had never looked so glad to say the words “We’ve got a body.”


	4. When Her Soul Flies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the author attempts to write her first mystery story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), who goes “oof” in the right places.

The body still lay where it had been found; Lanie had just arrived from the morgue when Castle and Beckett got to the scene. They parked on West 45th and were directed by uniforms past the posters advertising _Annie_ and _Man of LaMancha_ , down an alley behind the Broadmore Theatre. There, behind a dumpster, lay the remains of the victim.

She was dressed in a plaid skirt and a white Peter Pan blouse, and her white knee socks were spattered with blood. There were smudges of filth all over her blouse, which was torn, and her knees and hands were scraped, her arms bruised. Her red hair was a mess; where it had clearly once been in a neat French braid, it straggled messily across her dirt-smudged face, obscuring one glazed green eye. Her backpack was not far away; it lay on a pile of trash, one strap broken. Near it lay a well-worn paperback copy of _Twilight_ , the tassel of a bookmark poking out from somewhere near the middle.

Castle took all these details in as Lanie knelt beside the body, making her initial observation in grim silence. No one spoke as they gathered around the victim; there was none of the usual dark-humored bantering the detectives often used to leaven the atmosphere of even the most horrific crime scenes. There didn’t seem to be anything that anyone could think of to say that could possibly ease the crushing weight of this particular victim. When Lanie finally looked up at Beckett, Castle felt his gorge rise, and he had to swallow rapidly and breathe slowly to keep from vomiting when the medical examiner spoke. “Looks like she was strangled,” Lanie said softly.

Kate nodded. “Time of death?”

“Not long. Four or five hours.” Lanie looked down at the victim’s face. “She put up a good fight, judging by all the defensive wounds, but the killer probably didn’t have to work hard to overpower her.”

Castle swallowed hard again as Kate spoke. “Check for hairs, fibers… DNA.” As Lanie nodded, Kate crossed the alley, crouching down and unzipping the backpack. She pulled out a red folder and opened it, flipping through the papers. “Her first name is Lacey.” She replaced the folder and scanned the rest of the bag’s contents, reaching back in and pulling out a cell phone. She pushed a few buttons, then stood. “Phone’s password-protected. Shouldn’t be too hard to crack. Once we know who she is, we can move forward.” She picked up the book and dropped it into the bag, which she then picked up.

They waited as the girl’s body was placed gently onto a stretcher and covered with a sheet before being loaded into the morgue van, and then Kate turned to Castle. “Let’s get back to the office.”

They were both silent on the ride back, but she turned to him when she parked the car, laying a hand on his arm. “You okay?”

“No,” he replied honestly. “No, I’m not.”

She chose her next words carefully. “If you want to sit this one out, everyone will understand.”

He considered it seriously for a long moment, but finally shook his head. “No. I want to help.” He swallowed. “She deserves to have as many people as possible working as hard as they can to find who did this to her.”

Kate studied his face intently, and finally squeezed his arm, giving him a small smile. “You’d have made a good cop, Rick.”

He felt the corners of his mouth quirk up in reply. “What a shame that I chose a life of crime instead.”

It took the technician about five minutes to crack the password on Lacey’s phone – naturally, it was _cullen_ – and once that was done, they had not only a list of every phone call and text message that had been sent or received by that phone in the last three weeks, but also her mother’s name – Elizabeth Wylie – and address. When they arrived at the house, a well-kept brownstone in a nice neighborhood, the housekeeper advised them that Elizabeth Wylie was at work; she taught first grade at the nearby P.S. 290.

When they showed their badges at the front desk, the school secretary summoned Mrs. Wylie immediately, sending an aide to mind the classroom while the teacher came up. “Is there somewhere we can speak with her in private?” Beckett asked, and the secretary nodded, pointing them to a small conference room just off the main office. Mrs. Wylie met them there, looking at first surprised and then worried when Kate identified herself.

“It’s about your daughter, Mrs. Wylie,” Kate began, and the woman’s face paled.

She sat down shakily and stared at Kate, horror dawning in her eyes. “What is it?” she whispered. “What’s happened to Lacey?”

Kate swallowed hard, and Castle felt his heart constrict. “Her body was found this morning in an alley behind the Broadmore Theatre.”  
“No. No, it isn’t possible.” Mrs. Wylie’s hand shot into her pocket, and she pulled out her cell phone. She dialed with trembling fingers and spoke into the phone. “Hello, this is Elizabeth Wylie,” she said. “Can you please tell me if my daughter Lacey is in school?” There was a long pause, and Kate felt her eyes widen when Wylie’s face flushed with color, her body relaxing. “She is? Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. May I speak with her?” There was another, briefer pause, and when Mrs. Wylie spoke again, it was with a clear effort at maintaining a normal tone. “Hi, honey, how’s your day? Good. Math test go all right? Wonderful! Listen, I need you to wait at school for me today. All right? I’m going to come and pick you up. No, everything’s fine. I’ll see you about 3:30. Okay? Bye, sweetie.”

Mrs. Wylie put the phone down on the table, her hand pressing on it as though holding onto whatever she’d been told. “Coincidentally,” she said, her voice shaking again, “my daughter was standing in the office, bringing something down for her teacher.”

Castle stared at Kate. How was this possible? But Mrs. Wylie was speaking again. “Why did you think this dead child was my daughter, Detective?”

“Your daughter’s backpack and cell phone were found in the alley, about five feet away from the body.”

There was a long moment of silence as Mrs. Wylie clearly turned that concept over in her mind, and then Kate spoke again. “Would you mind bringing your daughter down to the precinct when you pick her up? We’d like to ask her some questions and see if she can identify who our victim might be.”

“Of course,” Mrs. Wylie replied. “We’ll come this afternoon.”

When Mrs. Wylie and her daughter arrived, they came in company with Mr. Wylie, his son Josh, and the family attorney. Lacey – the real Lacey – was a poised young lady of fourteen in jeans and an NYU hoodie, whose brown hair fell in ringlet curls all around her freckled face. Once they were all seated in the conference room, it was Lacey who spoke first, sitting forward in her chair with her hands folded on the table. “Detective Beckett,” she began, “am I in trouble?”

“No, Lacey,” Beckett replied, smiling slightly, “you’re not. We just need to ask you some questions about a crime we’re trying to solve.”

“My mom said some girl got killed.”

“That’s true.” Beckett stood, opening the box she had brought into the room with them. She drew out the backpack first. “Do you recognize this?”

Lacey studied it. “No, I don’t think so.”

Beckett opened the bag and began removing its contents, laying them on the table. “How about any of this?”

Lacey reached, then paused. “May I?”

“It’s better if you don’t touch,” Beckett replied, “but you can look closer if you’d like.”

Lacey stood and leaned across the table, examining the items. “That’s my name; well, my first name, at least. But none of this is my handwriting, and the work looks like stuff I did last year.” She pointed at one paper. “I remember, because I had a lot of trouble with surface area and volume.” She smiled slightly. “Math isn’t really my best subject.”

“Is this your book?” Beckett pulled out the paperback, and Lacey made a face. “No way. I hate _Twilight_. Vampires aren’t supposed to sparkle in the sunlight, and that girl Bella just makes me want to barf. She’s so fake.” She shook her head.

“What about this cell phone?”

Lacey’s eyes widened. “Yes. That _is_ mine. I lost it on the subway yesterday – somebody picked my pocket.” She turned to her mother. “See? I told you.”

“All right, you’re not grounded any more.” Mrs. Wylie gave her daughter a slight smile.

Kate paused for a moment, her eyes flicking from person to person around the room, considering. Finally she seemed to come to a decision. “I’d like you to look at a photograph and see if you know the person in it.”

“Is it the dead girl?” Lacey cocked her head at Beckett’s nod. “Okay.”

“You don’t have to look if you don’t want to, honey,” Mrs. Wylie said, but Lacey shook her head.

“No, it’s okay. If I can help, I want to. And besides, this girl had my cell phone. Maybe she knew me, or maybe I’ve seen her around. You know?” She looked at Beckett. “Show me your picture.”

With the blood washed away and her hair straightened, the dead girl in the photo looked like she was sleeping – if you could ignore the stainless steel surface she was laying on. Lacey studied her for a long moment, then finally shook her head. “No, I’ve never seen her before. I’m sorry, Detective.”

“That’s all right. Thank you for checking. We appreciate your help.” She offered Lacey a card. “If you can think of anything at all – maybe something weird that happened recently, or something like that – please give me a call.”

“I will.” The girl slipped the card into her pocket. “Can I have my phone back?”

Beckett shook her head, an expression of regret on her face. “Sorry, but we have to keep it. It’s evidence.”

“Can I at least copy down the numbers out of it? I don’t have a phone book.”

“I’ll go you one better,” Beckett replied. “I’ll get you a printout.” She stepped out of the room to do just that, returning a few minutes later with two sheets of paper. “Here you go.”

“Thanks, Detective!” Lacey folded the pages up and slipped them into her pocket. “Good luck finding whoever did this.”

Beckett smiled. “Thank you, Lacey.”

She walked the group out, then returned to her desk, leaning against it next to Castle and staring up at the murder board. Lacey’s name under the heading of “VICTIM” had already been replaced by “Jane Doe,” and Lacey’s photograph, provided by her mother, moved to the side, her pertinent information scribbled underneath.

“Who are you?” she whispered to the dead girl on the board.

Castle sighed softly, his hand itching to draw her close. He knew better; PDA at her place of work was probably the quickest way he could irritate her right now. Instead, he spoke in an undertone. “Want to go for Italian later?”

She smiled slightly without looking at him. “Sure.”

He nodded, then stood. “Coffee?”

“Please.” She gave him a look of gratitude, then resumed studying the board.

When he returned a few minutes later with two coffees, Ryan and Esposito were just coming around the corner. “Got a hit,” Esposito called out, and both of them turned to face him.

“What’d you find out?” Beckett asked.

“The outfit’s a uniform from Saint Giles Catholic School. Staten Island. Got a list of all the girls absent today that are around the age of our victim. Check it out.” He handed Beckett a sheet of paper that bore a photocopy of a yearbook picture and a name.

“Lacey Reagan,” Castle read over her shoulder. “Age twelve. Fifth grader.”

“That’s definitely her,” Beckett said, looking from the photocopy to the picture of the dead girl’s body. “What the hell is a kid from Staten Island doing on Broadway in the middle of the morning when she ought to be at school? And what was she doing with Lacey Garrett’s cell phone?”

“All very good questions,” Castle replied. “Shall we investigate?”

“What a great idea, Castle; I never would have thought of that.”

He made a face at her, but followed her out to the car.

Lacey Reagan's foster mother, Denise Walters, was at home when Castle and Beckett arrived. The door was answered by a small black boy of about six, who led them into the living room of a cramped apartment, where Mrs. Walters, age approximately eighty-five, was seated on a decrepit sofa, her walker not far away. “Oh, my,” she whispered when Kate showed her the photograph of Lacey’s body. “Oh, my dear.” Her wrinkled mouth trembled, the rheumy eyes filling with tears. “What happened to her?”

“She was strangled, Mrs. Walters,” Kate said gently. “Her body was found behind the Broadmore Theatre on West 45th.”

“The Broadmore?” Mrs. Walters repeated. “That’s where they’re doing that play.” She shook her head. “That child wanted to be on Broadway so badly she could taste it. I told her I wasn’t sure, but that I’d think about it. She must have gone down there to find out about auditions.”

“What play, Mrs. Walters?” Castle inquired.

Mrs. Walters smiled slightly. “ _Les Miserables_ ,” she replied softly. “She wanted to play Cosette.”

Alexis met them for dinner at Francosi’s, a small Italian restaurant in an alley around the corner from Castle’s loft. They focused on delicious pasta and tiramisu, trying to put the day’s images out of their mind. Kate encouraged Alexis to chatter on, telling them about her day and a new boy she might be interested in and how Paige, who had sabotaged their science project in anger, was now trying to make it up to Alexis and Alexis was trying to decide whether to let her.

On their way home, Kate looked at Alexis curiously. “Did you ever want to act, Alexis?”

The girl shrugged from under her father’s arm. “When I was little, yeah, because Mom and Gram were both actors. But any more, not really. Once I realized what acting was really like, and how hard it is on you and on your family, I decided it wasn’t really my thing.” She grinned. “For awhile, I wanted to be a writer, like Dad. But my stories were terrible.”

“Oh, they weren’t terrible,” Castle protested. “Just a little… awkward.”

Alexis laughed. “They were terrible,” she repeated. “I found a notebook full of them not long ago. I threw it in the fireplace. They were that bad.”

Kate laughed. “I wrote some stories when I was a kid,” she confessed. “They were pretty awful.”

“What kind of stories?” Alexis was intrigued. So was her father.

Kate blushed slightly. “They were stupid.”

“No, really, what were they about?” the girl pressed.

“You have to promise not to laugh,” Kate finally said as they entered the building. Both Castles immediately made cross-my-heart gestures, and Kate rolled her eyes. “Fine. I wrote Star Trek fanfiction.”

There was a long moment of tense silence as they waited for the elevator. Kate could see Castle biting his lip hard. But he didn’t laugh, a fact for which she was grateful. Alexis, though, was grinning broadly. “Did you have a _thing_ for Captain Kirk, Detective?”

“I told you, it’s Kate. And no; I was actually more into Wesley Crusher.”

Castle made a small, strangled sound, but refrained from laughing. Barely. Kate glared at him for a minute before softening enough to grin at herself. “I told you it was stupid.”

“We all do embarrassing stuff when we’re kids,” Castle replied. “Someday, I’ll show you some of the stuff _I_ wrote back then.” He smirked, leaning forward as the elevator opened and speaking in a stage whisper. “I wrote James Bond fanfiction.”

He took her to bed not long after they got home, and he held her close in the dark for a very long time. Neither of them spoke; she simply snuggled up next to him and wrapped her arm around his chest, letting him rest his chin on her head and enjoying the gentle touch as his hand traced random patterns up and down her back. “How do you deal with it?” he asked her finally.

“It’s not easy,” she admitted. “The ones like this one are the ones that haunt you. Nobody deserves to die like that, but especially not a little kid.” She took a deep breath. “The best thing for it is just… find the guy. Find who did it, make them pay. And you convince yourself that you’ve done everything you can to make sure justice is served, that he won’t ever do anything like that to another kid ever again… and then you try to let it go.” She ran her hand across his chest, loving the way he felt under her fingers. “You do what you have to do to try and forget.”

He looked down at her, studied her face for a long time, and then shifted, drawing her up to kiss her warmly. She straddled his waist, leaning down with one hand braced on either side of his head, and she smiled slightly. “Exactly,” she whispered against his cheek. “It’s like any other case – you deal with the death, and then you find some way to remember that you’re still alive.” She reached back and took hold of him, stroking firmly until he groaned, and then she rose up, sinking back down and taking him inside herself. She settled on his hips with a soft moan, then smiled down into his eyes.

His hand came up to cup her cheek. “Kate,” he whispered, his other hand reaching for the bedside table. She leaned down to kiss him hard, then rose off him for just a moment to take the condom from him and roll it on. Once he was sheathed, she took him inside again and he groaned deeply at the sensation.

She gripped him hard with her inner muscles. “That’s right,” she murmured. “Focus on me. Forget about everything else. Just for a minute.”

She rose up and sank down again, her voice still whispering to him, keeping him focused on her, wrapping around his raw emotions and soothing him gently even as her body roused his to a fever pitch. His hands slid up to cup her breasts, his thumbs flicking her nipples, and she whimpered, nearly losing the hypnotic rhythm of her speech. Her hips stuttered and he grinned fiercely, letting one hand slide down to her hip. His thumb found her clitoris and rubbed firmly and she shattered above him, her body clamping down on his and her voice crying out in pleasure. In her pleasure he found his, his hips thrusting up and pushing deep inside her as he came, and when she collapsed onto his chest, he raised heavy arms to hold her tight.


	5. Danse Macabre

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The investigation into Lacey Reagan’s murder takes a turn for the weird.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), who gets so into the story that she forgets to beta read.

When Kate got to her desk the next morning – without Castle, who had to meet with his publisher – her phone was ringing. She grabbed it before it could go to voice mail and spoke into it breathlessly. “Beckett.”

_“Detective Beckett? This is Lacey Garrett.”_

“Lacey, what can I do for you?” Kate dropped into her chair and reached for her notepad.

_“Well, I’m not sure. This is kind of weird. My mom got me a new phone yesterday, and so I was sitting down last night to put all my numbers back into it, and I found a bunch of numbers in it that I don’t recognize. I think maybe that girl that stole it put her numbers in. I showed my mom, and she said I should call you and tell you about it.”_

“Your mom’s exactly right. Which numbers don’t you recognize?”

Lacey read off a list of seven names and numbers, all of which Beckett wrote down quickly. Then she added, _“Also, she took my dad’s number out and put in a different number; I guess maybe it was her dad.”_

“What’s the new number?”

 _“908-555-8031.”_ Lacey paused. _“That’s Jersey, isn’t it?”_

“It is.” Beckett nodded, tapping her pen tip on the paper. “Lacey, this is very helpful information. Thank you very much for calling me with it.”

_“You’re welcome. I hope you catch whoever did it.”_

After hanging up, Kate leaned back in her chair, studying the list. Then she sat forward and reached for the phone again.

When Castle arrived around noon with a bag of takeout Chinese, Beckett was flipping through the paperwork from Lacey Reagan’s CPS caseworker. She looked up and smiled slightly when he placed the bag on her desk. “Smells yummy.”

He smiled back. “Kung Pao chicken.”

“Ooh.” She put the paperwork aside and reached for the cardboard container he was offering her. “Thank you.”

“So, have you found out anything new?”

Beckett shook her head. “Not much.” She sighed, looking over at the board. “The lab’s backed up – one of the machines is down and they can’t do anything until it’s fixed, so we’re waiting on DNA and trace evidence. Lacey Garrett called; she says several of the numbers in her phone weren’t hers, and she thinks Lacey Reagan put them in there. Ryan and Esposito are running the local ones down right now, but they’re probably just school friends. She did have a number listed in there as her dad, and Lacey Garrett says it’s not her dad’s number. It’s a cell number, so we’re waiting to hear back on that.” She blew out a frustrated breath. “So I’m sitting here staring at a picture of a dead kid until the world decides to start working again.”

“I see.” Castle made a sympathetic face. “Well, while you’re waiting, I have a question for you. When’s the last time you took a vacation?”

She paused for thought, then shrugged. “It’s been awhile. Why?”

He grinned. “How would you like to take a couple week trip to Europe?”

She stared. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. They want me to go over and do some publicity stuff. Couple days in London, couple days in Edinburgh, couple days in Paris, couple days in Madrid.” He grinned wider, leaning forward to run an unobtrusive finger across the back of her hand. “What do you say? You, me, a little alone time on a different continent? It’ll be fun.”

“I don’t know.” She affected a pose of contemplation. “I do have a lot of stuff to do.”

“It can wait. And Montgomery will give you the leave.” He offered her an egg roll. “C’mon. Say you’ll go.”

She cocked her head, studying him for a long minute, and finally allowed the corner of her mouth to twitch up into a smile. “Okay. I’ll go.”

He resisted the urge to pump his fist in the air – barely. She rolled her eyes at him, but she was smiling, so he grinned back at her. Then he sobered a bit, leaning to look at her notes. “So what’s on the agenda for this afternoon?”

“Well, I got DCS’s file on Lacey; the caseworker was on a home visit when I called, but she’s going to swing by this afternoon and talk to me. Other than that, wait for the phone traces to come back and hope for a break.”

Castle nodded. “Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

She cast him a jaundiced look and he reviewed his last sentence, then grinned. “That wasn’t what I meant, but it sounds like a great idea. There’s a broom closet on the next floor up…”

“ _No_ , Castle.” She trotted out the I-mean-business tone that never failed to utterly not succeed with him, rolling her eyes when he only grinned wider.

He turned his chair so that he was sitting next to her, facing the files on the desk. “So,” he said, leaning one elbow on the surface, “What’s the file tell us about Lacey?”

“It’s a mixed bag, really,” Kate began, trying very hard to ignore the fact that, under the cover of the desk, he was inching his other hand closer and closer to her thigh. “She was an orphan; both her parents worked in the Twin Towers. She didn’t have any other family, so she ended up in the foster system. Her longest placement was with the first family she had; they never formally adopted her, though, and so when they moved to Virginia she stayed. After that, she bounced from foster to foster. The most recent placement was her second longest; she’d been there almost a year. Most of them only lasted a few months.”

“The Great Gilly Hopkins,” Castle murmured, and Beckett smiled slightly.

“Yeah.” She sighed, flipping a page. “She’s been seeing a therapist; we need to talk to him. Dr. Ryan Whitaker.” She made a note on her scratch pad, then reached for another set of papers. “I’ve also got the autopsy report from Lanie. She confirms death was due to strangulation; there was DNA under her fingernails that matches the DNA from the rape kit, so our killer probably has defensive wounds on his arms or hands.” Her lips thinned as she studied the papers. “She says there was also evidence of systematic, ongoing abuse.”

Castle felt his stomach roll. “Physical?”

“Sexual.”

Castle looked up at the murder board, at the school picture of a smiling Lacey Reagan which had replaced the photo of her still, dead body. “She fought back,” he said softly. “She wasn’t going to take it any more.”

Kate nodded. “My guess is she threatened to expose him. She was going to tell, and he killed her to shut her up.”

Castle cocked his head, studying Beckett. “Is it true, what you hear about child molesters that go to prison?”

When she smiled this time, it was wolfish. “Very.”

“Good.”

There was a brief consultation with the Sex Crimes Unit around the middle of the afternoon; the detectives there were willing to help in any way necessary, but they had plates as full as Homicide’s, and eventually consensus was reached that Beckett would keep the case and, if she needed assistance, would call.

The social worker – Rachel Henson – finally arrived a little after four. She was young, probably not more than twenty-two and probably straight out of college. She looked frazzled. Beckett and Castle met with her in the conference room over a cup of espresso.

“This really sucks,” were the first words out of Henson’s mouth.

“Yeah, it does,” Beckett agreed. “How long have you known Lacey?”

“I got her case… about two years ago. Her previous caseworker retired. He warned me that Lacey was a tough one, but really…” Henson shook her head. “I had _no_ idea.”

“What do you mean?” Castle inquired.

Henson sighed. “Lacey was only four when her parents were killed. She bonded fairly well with her first foster family, but she was eleven when they moved to Virginia and she was devastated. She’d come to think of them as her real family – she didn’t really remember her parents, and they were all the family she really knew. So she started acting out. None of her placements after that lasted longer than a few months. When the spot came open at Mrs. Wylie’s, though, I thought things had finally changed. They bonded almost immediately, and Lacey had finally settled down. She’d opened up to her therapist. She’d even started getting involved in extracurriculars and thinking about the future. She did a school play and the acting bug bit; she was obsessed with the theatre and had been begging to be allowed to audition for professional productions. Mrs. Wylie and I talked about it and we’d decided to go ahead and let her – she’d heard about a showing of _Les Mis_ that was opening up and she wanted to try out for Cosette. Now this.” She made a helpless gesture. “It just feels so… pointless now.”

Alexis had French club that night, so dinner was just the two of them in a quiet corner booth at Remy’s. Over burgers and shakes they carefully discussed everything they could think of except the case, fighting hard to forget, just for a little while. They walked home in the dark, hand in hand, speaking very little.

Alexis was just arriving home when Kate and Rick strolled around the corner, so she waited at the door for them and the three of them stepped into the elevator together. Kate leaned gently against Rick’s arm and Alexis watched them both, looking worried. “This one’s really getting to you, isn’t it?” she asked softly.

Kate nodded. “It’s hard,” she explained. “Adult victims are one thing, especially when it’s people who did something stupid to get themselves killed, like getting in over their heads with drugs or the mafia. But when it’s a kid… it’s hard.”

Alexis nodded. She didn’t know much about the case – her dad had been careful to make sure she was shielded from the details – but she knew that the victim had been a young girl and she knew it was taking a toll on both her father and the detective. Impulsively, she reached out and hugged Kate. Startled, Kate froze for only a second before hugging back with a smile. “Thanks, sweetie,” she murmured, brushing a stray lock of hair back from Alexis’s forehead. “I needed that.”

The girl smiled, pleased to have been able to help, before hugging Rick as well. “Don’t want you getting jealous,” she explained with a mischievous grin.

Rick just smiled and hugged her back.

Inside, Alexis went straight up to bed, citing a test in first period. Rick poured two glasses of wine, handing one to Kate before taking her hand and leading her upstairs to what was rapidly becoming their room. They stood together at the window for a long time, looking out over the city and sipping at their wine, before Rick finally set the glasses aside and took her in his arms. “God, I love to touch you,” he whispered, sliding her shirt off and pressing his lips to her collarbone. “I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of touching you.”

She shivered, her hands coming up to thread through his hair. “Tell me,” she murmured.

He grinned, moving up to kiss behind her ear the way she liked. “Tell you what?”

“Tell me what you’re thinking,” she murmured, her mouth moving against his stubbly jaw. “Tell me what you want to do.”

He chuckled against her pulse point. “Why, Detective Beckett, are you asking me to talk dirty to you?”

She laughed softly. “Yeah.”

His hands slid down her back and around her hips, flicking the button at the waist of her jeans and then pulling the zipper down. “I would be happy to do that for you,” he murmured, “as long as you return the favor.” He turned her body so that she was leaning back against him, his chin resting on her shoulder. One of his arms wrapped around her torso, holding her close. His other hand found its way under the elastic band of her panties.

She bit her lip as his hand slid all the way inside her panties, his fingers questing between her legs. “I’ll go you one better. I’ll start.” She panted softly for a second before her tongue slipped out to wet her lips. “I want you inside me right now so bad I could scream, but if you were, it would be over way too soon.”

“That is definitely not wrong,” he replied, grinning. “But I can still be inside you.” He moved his hand, and she groaned deeply as two of his fingers slid inside her body. “God, you feel so good, so hot and wet.”

“So good,” she whispered, her breath brushing against his skin as she turned her face to his. Her eyes were closed, her lips seeking his jawline. “So good inside me, yeah…”

“That’s right, baby,” he murmured against her lips, his fingers sliding slowly in and out of her. “You like it when I’m inside you. You know how I can tell? You grab hold of me like you don’t ever want to let go.”

She was, in fact, gripping him – with her hands as well as her inner muscles. “God, the way you touch me,” she breathed. “So good, Rick, please…”

He grinned fiercely against her ear. “You wanna come, baby? Want me to make you come?”

“Yeah,” she whined, her hips grinding down against his hand. “Yeah, I wanna come, please, please make me come.”

“I wanna make you come,” he assured her, to the accompaniment of her desperate sounds. “I wanna watch you, the way you come apart and sweat and shudder and cry. You’re absolutely _gorgeous_ when you’re screaming my name, did you know that?” He tightened his grip on her body as she writhed against him. “But you know what?” He paused to bite the side of her neck and she shuddered hard, grinding down on him and making a wordless sound of need. “You’re even more gorgeous when you’re begging for it.”

He pulled his hand away, laughing softly when her hips followed him and she made a sound of desperate disappointment. He tucked his fingers into her waistband, pulling her jeans and panties down together, and he pushed her toward the bed, turning her and laying her down on her back. His hands slid up her thighs, parting them gently, and he stepped between them, leaning down to kiss her mouth gently. Her arms came up to wrap around his shoulders, but he caught her wrists, raising them up above her head. He held them there for a moment, kissing her slow and deep, and then he released them as he started making his slow way down her body.

Her breathing was harsh and shallow as he worked his way down her sternum, pausing to pay slow, careful attention to each breast; in between licks and kisses and bites, he told her how beautiful she was, how much he enjoyed making love to her, how she tasted or smelled delicious. He wasn’t sure whether she was actually hearing his words over the needy, pleading sounds she was making, or whether it was just the sound of his voice that was doing it for her, but he kept it up anyway, because the results were astounding either way. Granted that his experience of her was very brief, he had still never seen her respond like this before, and it was amazing.

When his lips finally crossed her mons she cried out, and he chuckled softly against her skin as his fingers slipped between her folds once more. “God, you are so wet,” he whispered into the crease of her thigh. “You’re so wet for me.”

Her hips bucked as his fingers pushed inside her again. “Rick,” she panted. “Rick, _please_!”

He looked up at her face, flushed and sweaty and desperate, and he smiled slightly. “Have I mentioned,” he said casually, leaning forward to slowly inhale the scent of her arousal, “how much I absolutely love the way you taste?”

With those words, he lowered his mouth to her pussy, attacking her clit like a ravenous animal, pushing his fingers inside her harder and deeper. She convulsed, sobbing out her pleasure, and he kept going – sucking harder, pushing in deeper. He made her come again, and then again, and would have kept going but she pushed him away, shivering and whimpering as she fell back onto the bed.

He stood, shucking his clothing before climbing onto the bed beside her and taking her in his arms. She clung to him, her body still trembling. “My God,” she whispered against his chest. He smiled into her hair, stroking her sweaty skin until her shaking eased. Then he rolled her onto her back again, raising up between her legs. Her eyes widened. “Rick –” she began, but he stopped her by the simple expedient of kissing her warmly, his mouth owning hers, his tongue flicking against her lips until she parted them to grant him entry.

His cock slid into her simultaneously with his tongue, and she gasped, quivering, her fingers digging into his arms. “Rick,” she whispered as he kissed her slowly. “Rick, the condom…”

He paused. “Right.” He withdrew from her slowly, pressing a kiss to her temple. “How is it that I get so wrapped up in you, I completely forget?”

She laughed softly as he dug into the bedside table, then sheathed himself quickly before returning to her embrace. “Just that good, I guess,” she teased. Then he slid inside her again and she groaned, her eyes fluttering closed again. “Oh, Jesus.”

He kissed her again, nuzzled his face against hers, and began to thrust, pushing into her slowly but sinking as deep as he could with each press of his hips. Her breath caught in her throat, her back arching, and he wrapped his arms all the way around her, pulling her tightly against his body as he pushed in and in and in. Her legs wrapped around his waist, her arms around his shoulders, and she moaned, panting against his ear, her body straining toward him. “That’s right,” he whispered against her temple. “That’s right. You’re gonna come for me again.”

“N-no,” she whimpered. “I d-don’t think I c-can. Oh, God! J… oh… Just go ahead. Don’t wait for me.”

“Yes, you can,” he said, biting her neck again and making her whine. “You can, and you will.” His hand trailed downward, gripping her ass, and he did something with his hips that she hadn’t been expecting and she discovered suddenly that he was right – she could, and she did, her mind exploding and her body going stiff as though she’d had an electric shock. From some dim, hazy place within her own pleasure, she heard him groan his, and then the world went gray around the edges.

When she finally came back to herself, she was cuddled against him under the sheets, his hand stroking her skin tenderly. She raised her eyes to his, and he smiled slightly. “You okay?”

She closed her eyes for a moment, checking, and then opened them again. “I don’t think I can feel my legs.”

He laughed. “They’re there. I promise.”

“If you say so.” She snuggled against him. “That was…” _the best sexual experience of my life, ever._ “Intense.”

“You have a talent for understatement,” he observed.

She laughed softly, pressed a kiss to his pectoral and then yawned. He stroked her hair. “Go to sleep,” he murmured. “In the morning, I’ll take you to breakfast.”

“Okay,” she replied, closing her eyes again and snuggling closer against him. Soon, she was asleep. He lay awake for a long time, stroking her hair and wondering how the hell he’d gotten so lucky.


	6. Someday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The case is closed, and another question is answered as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto).

Physical violence was not generally the first thing Rick Castle expected in the morning, especially before his first cup of coffee, so when he was awakened from a sound sleep by a hearty, stinging smack from a wet towel wielded by his girlfriend, the shock was much akin to being awakened with a dash of ice-cold water. Compounding the surprise were the words which accompanied the blow: “You complete and total jerk!”

“What? What’d I do? I was asleep! I didn’t do it!”

“Yes, you did! God, I hate you right now!” With a final, killing glare, she turned on her bare heel and stalked back into the bathroom.

Now thoroughly confused, he tossed the covers back and followed her in, to find her leaning over the sink toward the mirror, holding her hair back with one hand while trying to apply concealer to one of the bruises on the side of her neck – bruises which were unmistakably bite-shaped. There were several, and there was no way any of them would be hidden by her clothing unless she wore a turtleneck. “Oh,” he said softly, realizing suddenly what she was so angry about. He studied her for a second, judging the level of her anger, before stepping up behind her and wrapping his arms around her towel-clad form. He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to her shoulder. “I would apologize, but I’m not sorry.” He opened his mouth, pressing his incisors gently against the spot he’d just kissed. “I enjoyed it.”

She glared at him for a moment in the mirror before her face softened and she gave him a slight, grudging smile. “So did I.”

“Here. Let me help.” He took the makeup stick from her, brushing her hair aside, and carefully applied it to one of the more egregious marks, gently blending it in until it wasn’t so noticeable. “You’ll probably be okay if you wear your hair down.”

She nodded, holding her hair and watching him in the mirror as he applied makeup to another mark. His face bore a look of careful concentration, and his fingers were tender as he touched the slightly-sore areas. “Thanks,” she murmured.

He smiled slightly. “Least I can do.”

They didn’t speak again until he’d finished, and when he put the makeup stick down on the counter, she turned in his arms and kissed him gently. “Last night was amazing,” she admitted.

“Yes, it was.” He kissed her back, slow and thorough, and smiled into her eyes when he released her. “But don’t get used to it; I don’t think I have the stamina to do that every night.”

“Oh, God, I couldn’t take it if you did,” she admitted, laughing softly. Then she pushed gently on his chest. “I have to finish getting dressed. And I believe you promised me breakfast.”

“I believe you’re right,” he replied, reaching around her for his toothbrush. “Guess that means I’d better get dressed, too.”

“I’m certainly not taking you out in public looking like that,” she replied, her eyes in the mirror moving up and down his naked, sleep-rumpled form with a certain possessive gleam. “I’d have to commit all kinds of murders.”

He laughed, sticking the toothbrush into his mouth and wandering away to hop in the shower.

Twenty minutes later, he was escorting her into the elevator when her cell rang. She sighed softly. “If I have to go in without my promised breakfast, I’m going to be very surly all day.”

“If you have to go in, I will go and get breakfast and bring it to you,” he promised.

She flipped the phone open. “Beckett.”

 _“Hey, the traces came back on those phone numbers,”_ Esposito’s voice came through the line. _“Got some stuff I thought you’d want to know about first thing.”_

“All right, what have you got?” She covered the mouthpiece. “Esposito says the traces came back on the numbers in Lacey’s phone.”

Castle nodded, leaning in to listen as Esposito spoke again. _“Most of the numbers are kids she went to school with. One of them’s a prepay cell with fake registration information, paid for in cash. The one listed as her dad goes to a Stephen Warren, age thirty-six, out of Jersey; got a rap sheet as long as my arm with priors for burglaries, drugs, prostitution, assault, theft, you name it.”_

“What’s a guy like that doing with his number in a twelve-year-old girl’s cell phone?” Castle asked.

_“Don’t know, but I’ll tell you what I do know. I do know that phone records indicate Lacey made a few calls to a number that wasn’t in her phone list – a number both Warren and the prepay phone were getting a bunch of calls from.”_

“And what number was that?” Beckett asked as they stepped out of the elevator on the ground floor.

_“Dr. Ryan Whitaker’s office.”_

Beckett looked up at Castle with an expression of mixed horror and disgust. “Her therapist.”

 _“Got uniforms on the way to pick up Warren now,”_ Esposito interjected. _“He’ll be in holding whenever you get here.”_

“All right,” Beckett replied. “We have an appointment with Dr. Whitaker at ten, but I’m thinking we might show up a little early and see what we can find out. You and Ryan look into him, see what you can pull up.”

 _“You got it, Boss.”_ Esposito hung up, and Kate slipped her phone back into her pocket.

“Every time I think nothing about this case can possibly make it any more nauseating, something happens to prove me wrong,” Castle commented, looking ill.

“Cases like this one are tough,” Kate replied, squeezing his arm. “It’ll be better once we put him in jail.”

“I hope you’re right,” he replied, wrapping his arm around her.

As they sat at a table outside a small café waiting for their breakfast orders to arrive, Beckett made two more phone calls: one to the social worker, and one to the foster mother. When she was done, she sat tapping her fingers on the tablecloth and studying Castle. “So the therapist takes her twice, for a week at a time, off to a camp for disturbed kids. The most recent trip was about three weeks ago. Lacey didn’t want to go, but Henson and Mrs. Walters both thought it would be a good idea. So she went, but when she came back, she was sullen and withdrawn and didn’t want to talk about it.”

“Camp?” Castle repeated. “During the school year?”

Kate glanced down at her notes. “Camp Remington,” she replied. “In western Kentucky.”

Castle pulled his phone out and began poking at the screen. “Camp Remington is an Episcopalian camp in South Dakota,” he replied. “Rentable cabins and so forth.”

“There was no camp.” Beckett picked up her phone again and called the station. “Ryan. Get me any travel information on Dr. Ryan Whitaker for the last year. I want to know any time he’s been anywhere outside the city. Forty-five minutes.” After waiting for the reply, she hung up again just as their food arrived. Picking up her fork, she pointed it at Castle. “I think we’re going to need to see Dr. Whitaker’s arms.”

“I think we will, too,” he agreed before applying himself to his food.

They arrived at Whitaker’s East Side office just after nine, walking past the fortuitously-empty receptionist’s desk. The waiting room was empty except for one tired-looking woman who was reading a magazine. They walked past her, down the hall toward the wide door marked “Private”. Kate leaned against the door, listening, and Castle did so as well, straining his ears. The voices they heard were muffled by the wood, but one of them was the voice of an adult man and the other, the ambiguously high-pitched tone of a child. “That’s right,” the man’s voice was saying. “We’re going to go on a trip. You’ll have lots of fun. But I need to make sure you can keep a secret; if you can’t, if you tell anyone what happens while we’re gone, something bad might happen. You don’t want something bad to happen, do you?”

“No,” the child’s voice answered warily. “I won’t tell.”

“You promise?” the man insisted.

“I promise.”

Beckett pushed the door open. “I don’t.” She folded her arms, staring at the doctor with an expression of the utmost contempt. “Ryan Whitaker, you’re under arrest.”

Stephen Warren was a tall, dirty fellow in his late twenties, with long, oily hair and a pockmarked face. He was staring sullenly at the mirror in the interrogation room when Beckett pushed the door open and entered, Castle on her heels. She tossed her file down on the table, looking at Warren like something particularly disgusting she might have found on the sidewalk. “Where’d you get those gouges on your hands, Mr. Warren?”

Warren snatched his hands off the table and hid them in his lap. “Cat scratched me.”

“Funny, they don’t look like cat scratches,” she replied, leaning against the mirror. “They look to me like your DNA’s gonna match what we found under Lacey Reagan’s fingernails. And when it does, you’re going down for rape and murder one.” She paused, studying his face. “The D.A. likes you for the needle, Stephen; he’s pretty sure the jury will jump on the idea for a guy that likes to rape and kill little girls.”

“If you’re so sure you got me dead to rights, why am I sitting here in this room, then? You don’t need to ask me no questions. Just hand the case off and let me go to trial.”

Beckett’s mouth twisted into something approximating a smile. Castle felt a chill go up his spine at the expression, and he knew he never wanted to see her look at _him_ like that. She crossed her arms. “I want the details on Whitaker,” she said, her voice very quiet. “You give me everything you have on him. Names, dates, everything. I want to know what other kids were involved, I want to know if any of their parents knew anything. I want to know _everything_. And if you can satisfy me that you’ve given me every shred of information inside the maggot-infested swamp that passes for your brain, I will _consider_ talking to the D.A. about taking the needle off the table.”

“Consider?” Warren stared at her. “No. I want to know for sure.”

Beckett’s laugh held no humor. “Sorry, Stephen. That’s the best you’re getting. Here’s the thing. I’ve already got enough to put him away. I’ve got his phone records, his financials, and copies of the plane tickets he bought for you and him and Lacey to go to Mexico when she was supposed to be at a camp for disturbed kids. I’ve got airport security footage of the three of you getting on a plane. I already have enough to lock him up for thirty years. But I want more, Stephen. I want him _under_ the jail. Because, see, I like kids. And people like him, people who exploit kids and take kids that are already hurting and ruin them further? They disgust me even more than guys like you that kill them. So what’s it gonna be, Stephen? You gonna talk, or you gonna take the needle?”

Warren studied her for a long moment, his eyes occasionally flicking to Castle’s expressionless face. Finally he leaned forward, putting his hands back on the table. “I knew Whitaker from high school,” he began. “We ran with the same group. But he cleaned up his act, went to college, and I stayed on the streets. So a couple years ago, me and this other guy from school, we got a lead on some good money we could make muling. Only guys like us, we’re the kind of guys Customs takes a real close look at, right? So we need somebody clean.”

“And Whitaker’s clean.” Beckett nodded. “Where did Lacey come in?”

Warren shrugged. “More bodies means more drugs, and more drugs means more money. So Ryan, he says he’s got all these kids, and nobody looks twice at a guy traveling with his kid, you know? So I go with ‘em, only we make like we don’t know each other, ‘cause I gotta intro him to the guys down south. And I stay clean the whole time, so if I get stopped at Customs they got nothin’ on me, but Ryan and the kid, they just breeze on through like nothin’, you know?”

“And it helps if he brings along a little girl, right?” Castle spoke for the first time, his tone under tight control. “Because little girls are so much more fun than little boys.”

Warren pointed a finger at Castle. “I never laid a hand on that kid.”

“Those gouges on your hands say otherwise,” Beckett pointed out.

Warren sighed. “Okay, yeah, I killed her. But other than that. I never touched that kid until Monday morning in the alley.”

“So it was Whitaker who was molesting her?”

Warren nodded. “I swear to God, it wasn’t me.”

“So why’d you kill her, Stephen?”

Warren sighed, leaning back in his chair. “Ryan called Friday night. We were planning another trip, but she was bucking. She told him she wasn’t gonna do it any more, and if he tried to make her, she was gonna tell her social worker. He told me I had to shut her up. He told me where she was gonna be – she’d been talking about that stupid play she wanted to be in for weeks. So it wasn’t hard to find her. She cut through the alley heading toward the subway station and I caught her in there.”

Beckett studied him for a long moment, then reached out and opened the file folder. She pulled out several blank sheets of paper and pushed them across the table, dropping a pen on top of them. “Start writing.”

Warren picked up the pen.

Several hours later, the murder board wiped clean again and the evidence boxed neatly away, Kate took her jacket off the back of her chair and looked up at Rick as she turned off her monitor. “Feed me?”

“Of course. Chinese or Remy’s?”

“Chinese.”

“Come on. I know a great place on the upper West Side.”

They sat together in a quiet corner booth, and Kate rested her head on Rick’s shoulder as they waited for their food to arrive. “I hate cases like this,” she confessed, her voice low. “Even after they’re solved, you feel dirty from having to deal with people like that.”

He nodded, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. “I know exactly what you mean.”

She sighed, closing her eyes for a moment. Then she opened them again and nudged him. “Let me out, please. I need to go use the restroom.”

“Sure.” He stood, letting her slip out of the booth, and then sat down again. Their food arrived just as she was returning, and he stood again, letting her back in. When the waitress was gone, he reached for his fork, only to realize she was staring at her plate without seeming to see it. “Kate?”

She looked up at him with an expression he’d never seen before, then blinked once and her face cleared. “Sorry,” she said softly. She looked down at her hands again, then back up at him. “I started.”

“You… what, now?”

She bit her lip. “My period,” she whispered.

He blinked at her, and then his brain connected. “Oh.” He studied her. “That’s… good, though. Right?”

She shrugged, reaching for her fork. “Yeah, I guess.” Her expression was tightly controlled, but she couldn’t stop him from reading her eyes.

He reached out and took her hand with his, tucking a finger from his other hand under her chin and tilting her face up to look at him. “Kate.”

She swallowed hard, and her eyes glistened in the low light. “I guess I was just… getting used to the idea.”

He leaned down and kissed her gently. “I made you a promise,” he said softly. “Remember? Whether it’s now or later. It might not be now, but it will happen. You’re going to be a great mom, and we’re going to have beautiful babies.”

She smiled slightly. “Just not right now.”

“Well, no,” he replied. “But it would probably be best if we waited until after the wedding anyway. Some things I don’t mind setting a bad example for Alexis, but some things I do.” He winked.

She couldn’t help it; she laughed. Then she poked him in the shoulder. “You seem awfully sure there’s going to be a wedding.”

He grinned. “I’m very sure.”

One of her eyebrows climbed toward her hairline. “Don’t you think you need to ask me first?”

“I’ll get around to it eventually.” He held up a forkful of lo mein. “You should probably eat; Chinese food isn’t any good cold.”

The look she gave him was almost as sharp as a punch in the shoulder, and he offered her a bite of his chicken with an ingenuous expression. She continued to glare for a second longer before leaning over and snagging it neatly off the fork with her teeth. “You’re a jerk,” she said around it.

He leaned down to kiss her again, just a quick peck on her lips. “You like it.”

Arriving home, they found Alexis at the kitchen table working on her homework. Castle dropped a kiss on the top of her head as he passed, moving into the kitchen and pulling out ice cream. Kate paused to touch the girl’s shoulder in greeting, her eyes scanning the handwriting on the page automatically. She started past, then paused, leaning slightly forward. “Having trouble?” she asked, noting the marks of several erasures.

“Yeah, actually,” the girl replied. “I can’t get this one to come out right.”

Kate ran a finger down the page of Alexis’s open chemistry book, reading the directions. “Oh,” she said. “I see. This must be a new book.”

Alexis raised her eyebrows. “Why do you say that?”

“Because this is wrong.” She pointed at the example exercise. “Let me show you.” She took a seat, picking up Alexis’s spare pencil and a blank sheet of paper. Her pencil moved swiftly across the surface, the formula spilling out onto the page. “Here’s where they’ve messed up. See? You’re never going to get zinc arsenate out of that; there’s not enough oxygen.” There was a long silence as both Castles stared at her. She blushed. “What?”

“I didn’t know you were a chemistry whiz,” Alexis finally said.

Kate shrugged. “I like science.”

“Sweetheart, I think we just found your chemistry tutor,” Rick said cheerfully. He leaned over, setting two bowls of ice cream and two spoons on the table. “You girls have fun.” Taking a third bowl, he disappeared into his study as Alexis turned the page and asked Kate to explain the next question.

An hour or so later, Alexis slipped into the study to plant a peck on her father’s cheek and tell him good night. He wrote for about ten more minutes before saving and shutting his computer, then he wandered out into the living room only to find the lights already dimmed and no Kate in evidence. He found her upstairs, about to step into a hot shower. “Ooh,” he said. “Wait for me.”

He held her close in the water for a time, resting his cheek on the top of her head and letting it rinse their day away. Then he reached for the shampoo, pouring a dollop into his hand and then slowly working it into her hair. She sighed against him. “That feels so good.”

He smiled slightly. “I’m glad.” He let his soapy hands make their way down her neck, still rubbing gently, and then across her shoulders, working out the stress knots and smoothing out the muscles.

She relaxed against him, her eyes closed, and hummed with pleasure. “You don’t ever have to stop doing that,” she murmured. “Ever.”

He chuckled softly, his hands moving lower and lower down her back, before cupping her ass gently. He made a soft sound of inquiry, to which she replied with a sound of assent, and he reached into the shower caddy for one of the condoms he’d stashed there. Once it was on, he lifted her, pressing her against the wall and sliding inside her. Her legs wrapped around his waist and her arms around his neck, her fingers burying themselves into his hair. “Yes,” she whispered into his ear. “God, yes.”

It didn’t take long; she was sensitive and he was desperate and within just a few minutes she was calling out his name and he was groaning hers against her neck. They staggered to the bed a few minutes later, wrapping their bodies around each other in the dark. He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Someday,” he whispered into her hair. “I promise.”


	7. One Step Forward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So much for keeping the press out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), who sees pods where I see pods.

With the case done, and nothing new presenting itself on Friday morning, Kate took Friday afternoon off after the paperwork was done and window-shopped her way up Fifth Avenue, occasionally venturing inside a store and even more occasionally trying something on. She actually spent money on a pair of jeans at Prada, but by three o’clock that was the only purchase in her hands when she paused in front of the window at Tiffany & Co. to study a bracelet that there was no way she’d ever be able to afford.

She nearly came out of her skin when a pair of arms came around her waist from behind, but she recognized the grip a split second before giving Rick a broken nose. “Don’t _do_ that!” she exclaimed, turning in his arms. “I almost elbowed you in the face.”

He grinned, leaning down to kiss her gently. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“You wouldn’t have if we’d been at home,” she confessed. “I’m just not used to having guys grab me around the waist when I’m out in public.” She studied him for a second. “Speaking of which, what are you doing out here, anyway? I thought you were writing all day.”

“I was. And I will be again. I forgot I had an appointment with Paula.”

“Ah.”

He kissed her again, then leaned around her to look in the window. “Which one are you eyeballing?”

She laughed. “All of them,” she admitted. “But mostly that.” She pointed at a bracelet. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

“Yes, it is,” he replied, leaning down to kiss the side of her neck. “But it would be more beautiful on you.”

She laughed again, softly. “I could never afford something like that,” she admitted. “And even if I could, I couldn’t ever wear it for fear that something would happen to it.”

“That’s what insurance is for,” Rick pointed out.

“True. But it’s still – what is that guy doing?”

Rick looked up, turning his gaze in the same direction as hers, and sighed. “Damn.” Then he took her hand. “We’re busted,” he said. “Might as well give them something to talk about.”

“Busted?” she repeated, staring at him as he pulled her behind him into the store. “What are you talking about?”

Inside, the store was quiet and well-lit, diamonds sparkling from every corner and display case. Rick drew Kate close to him and steered her toward the nearest case. “The paparazzi,” he said simply.

“Oh, great,” Kate groaned. “So I can expect to see this shopping trip all over Page Six tomorrow.”

“It’ll probably be on their website by tonight,” he confirmed cheerfully. Then he leaned over the case. “Nice.”

A salesman in a suit was gliding toward them. “Madam. Sir. Is there anything I can show you?”

Kate opened her mouth to issue a denial, but Rick beat her to it. “Yes, actually. There’s a bracelet in the window. Diamond and platinum. Looks like flowers.”

“Our flower link diamond bracelet, of course.” The salesman nodded. “Please, come this way.” He led them to another counter, where the same bracelet lay on a black velvet pillow, catching the display light.

“Oh, sparkly,” Rick commented. Then he gestured at the case, looking at Kate. “Well, try it on.”

“What? No, Rick, I told you, I can’t –”

“I can,” he replied, nodding once at the salesman. “I’d like her to try it on, please.”

Over her continued protests, the salesman, who clearly smelled a hefty commission, opened the case and removed the bracelet, placing it in Rick’s outstretched hand. Rick turned to Kate and gave her his most charming smile.

Her lips pressed tightly together, but she allowed him to slip it onto her wrist. His fingers trailed down to take her hand once it was on, turning her arm gently to catch the light. “I was right,” he said softly. “It’s even more beautiful on you.” He nodded once at the salesman, who smiled and returned the tray, sans bracelet, to the display and went to retrieve a box.

“Rick, it’s too much,” Kate whispered when they were alone. “My God, did you see the price?”

“I don’t care,” he replied, drawing her close to him, his voice equally soft. “I want you to have it.” Her eyes shimmered, and he studied her expression, which was desperately unhappy. “What is it?” he asked softly. “Talk to me.”

She bit her lip. “I don’t want you to do this,” she admitted. “I don’t want you to think you have to buy me things. Rick, I don’t care about your money.”

He laughed, leaning forward to kiss her gently. “I know you don’t care about my money,” he assured her. “Kate, the money means nothing unless I use it. And I never would have… gotten involved with you if I thought for a second that you were the kind of woman who’d chase it. I _want_ to do this. I _want_ to buy you beautiful things.” He studied her, his eyes holding hers, letting her look deep into them. “Please. Won’t you let me do this for you?”

She studied him for a very long time, her eyes never leaving his. At last, she swallowed hard and nodded. “Okay.”

He leaned forward to kiss her mouth gently. “Thank you.” Then he grinned and took her hand. “Now, you’re going to need a necklace to go with that.”

“What? Castle!”

He eventually chose a Tiffany key with a bow that had been made in a floral design, and since she was already wearing the chain with her mother’s ring, it went into a box after she’d tried it on and he pronounced himself enchanted with it. While the salesman was boxing it, he drifted toward the rings, still holding her hand. He pretended to be idly examining the items, but by now she had her nose in the wind, and her eyes narrowed as she watched him. “What are you up to?”

He reached out, pulling her to him. “I made you a promise,” he said softly, “on Sunday, and again last night. Remember?”

She nodded, studying him warily.

He took her hands in his, interlacing their fingers. “And last night, I told you that eventually I’m going to ask you a question. But you’re not ready for me to ask it yet, so I’m waiting.”

She nodded again, a little of the wariness leaving her face, but not much.

He leaned forward, softly pressing his lips to hers. “This,” he murmured, “is for that promise, and for that question that I’m not asking yet.”

She swallowed hard, tears standing in her eyes again, but she nodded a third time, and he pulled her to him, holding her close as his eyes flicked over the trays of rings.

Half an hour later they left the store, bracelet and necklace in the tiny Tiffany bag in Kate’s left hand, and a diamond ring on her right, sparkling brilliantly in the sun. Like the necklace and the bracelet, the ring was flower-shaped, turning the three separate pieces into a set. There were now several photographers milling about in the area, trying to look unobtrusive while they waited for a chance to snap photographs, and Rick studiously ignored them while hailing a cab. He put his arm around Kate’s waist. “Ignore them,” he said in an undertone. “They won’t go away, and acknowledging them just makes them worse. If they think they can get under your skin, they’ll try; pictures of people flying off the handle are worth more than pictures of people minding their own business.”

She looked somewhat taken aback as he opened the cab door to usher her inside. “Really?”

He nodded, sliding in with her and giving the cabbie his address. “Really. Look at Britney.”

“Ugh, I’d rather not.” They both laughed, and she leaned against him, looking down at the diamond on her hand as he put his arm around her shoulders. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“Thank _you_ ,” he replied, “for letting me.”

She smiled tightly. “It was a near thing.”

“I know.” He pressed a kiss to her temple. “Kate, listen. I know you don’t need it. All right? I know that you don’t need to be spoiled and pampered, that you like being strong and being self-sufficient. I get that, and I honestly wouldn’t have you any other way. But I like to do things like that. It…” He paused, searching for words. “Just because I buy you things doesn’t mean I think you need to be kept, or that I’m trying to buy your affection. It’s just… something I like to do.” He paused. “Plus, you’re very pretty when you’re covered in sparkles.”

She studied his face, considering his words carefully, and finally nodded. “Okay,” she said softly. She put a finger against his lips when he leaned down to kiss her again. “ _But_ that doesn’t mean it’s okay for you to do this all the time.”

“Killjoy.” He bit the tip of her finger lightly. “Fine, but can I at least take you out to an expensive dinner tonight where you can show off all those little sparkles?”

“Isn’t it movie night with Alexis tonight?”

“We’ll take her with us.” He flashed her his biggest, cheesiest smile. “Come on. Please?”

She pretended to consider before finally sighing. “Oh, fine. But you’d better take me someplace good.”

“Oh,” he replied, “I have just the place.”

Alexis was lying on the couch when they arrived home, headphones in her ears, on her stomach looking at her computer. Rick waved a hand in front of her face to get her attention, and she pulled one earbud out, ignoring him and looking straight over at Kate. “Well, I want to see.”

Kate blinked. “See what?”

“See the jewelry.” She sat up, turning the computer to show them the front page of a locally-based gossip blog. The screen was dominated by a photograph of the two of them leaving Tiffany, the bag of jewelry in Kate’s hand vibrantly blue against the backdrop of the bag from Prada. “Taylor called about ten minutes ago to tell me this was up. So, let me see.”

“Don’t take too long,” Castle said, turning toward the stairs. “I’m about to call and get us all reservations.”

“Where are we going?” Alexis asked as Kate moved to sit beside her on the sofa.

“Delmonico’s,” he replied, heading up the stairs to shower and change.

Alexis squealed. “My favorite!” Then she set her laptop aside and looked at Kate expectantly. “Well? Don’t keep me hanging. Dad has _great_ taste in jewelry.”

Smiling slightly, Kate pulled the boxes out of the shopping bag, opening first the necklace and then the bracelet for Alexis to ooh and ahh over. Then Alexis reached out, taking Kate’s right hand. “And this,” the girl said softly, “is perfect.” She looked up at Kate, tilting her head curiously. “But you have it on your right hand.”

“It’s not an engagement ring, Alexis,” Kate said softly.

Alexis studied her for a long moment. “Why not?” she finally said bluntly. “He loves you. And you love him.”

“It’s… complicated.”

Alexis smiled slightly. “It’s not complicated. You’re scared. And it’s okay to be scared. But Kate… he really does love you. I can tell, you know.”

Kate bit her lip. The last thing she needed to do was have this conversation with Rick’s sixteen-year-old daughter, but the words spilled out anyway. “Alexis, he’s a twice-divorced celebrity playboy.”

Alexis closed the boxes of jewelry, slipping them back into the Tiffany bag, before standing and turning to face Kate. “You say that like I don’t know,” she said softly. “You say that like you think I don’t see that. Every time there’s a book launch party, every time he goes somewhere and it ends up on Page Six or The Superficial, I see that. Okay? Every time he signs some groupie’s chest, I see that. But that’s not all there is to see, Kate. He’s childish and he’s immature and he overreacts to every little thing, but he’s the best dad in the world, and he’s successful and he’s smart and he’s trustworthy and patient and kind – he’s practically the Boy Scout Law personified. Sure, he dates a lot of girls, but you know something? Since he started shadowing you, he’s actually gone out with a total of three people, and one of them is you.” She turned toward the stairs, paused with her foot on the first riser, and turned back again. “And I’ll tell you one other thing. I was very little when Mom left, but I know for a fact that _she_ left, not him. And I could tell you horror stories about what it was like when he was married to Gina. Just because somebody’s twice divorced doesn’t mean they aren’t capable of being married; sometimes it means they’ve been picking the wrong people.”

She turned then and made her way upstairs to change, leaving Kate sitting on the sofa feeling gobsmacked.

Kate had never eaten at Delmonico’s, but the fact that Castle had chosen it as the place to “show off all those little sparkles” told her already how to plan her outfit. She ended up choosing a simple black dress and black heels; it was a perfect backdrop to the beautiful diamonds. She pulled her hair up into a simple twist and dusted her face with makeup, darkening her eyes carefully to a seductive, smoky shade. She knew she’d succeeded when she stepped out of the bathroom and he turned from the window to face her.

“You look amazing,” he said simply, moving to take her in his arms. He leaned down to kiss her gently, and she smiled up at him, searching his eyes. Alexis’s words were still ringing in her head, prompting her to look at him tonight in a new way. She took in the way he offered one of his arms to her and the other to Alexis; she watched as he opened doors, pulled out chairs, behaved like a gentleman. She listened to the conversation between man and daughter, the way he gently parented without seeming to do so, and how he guided Alexis into making decisions without ever showing what it was that he was doing. She saw the quiet pride he took in his child’s accomplishments, and the love in his eyes when he looked at her.

And she saw the careful way he made sure that Kate was included in every conversation; she smiled when he teased her and she listened when he talked, discovering that when she looked for them, she could find hidden layers of meaning behind almost everything he said. She saw the quiet pride he took in having her there with him, the way he almost glowed every time he touched her. And she saw, now that she knew what to look for, the love in his eyes when he looked at her.

The night was something of a blur – Delmonico’s was a place to see and be seen, and there was a constant stream of faces as people who she recognized from magazines and movies paused at their table to greet Rick on their way in or out. They, too, stopped to greet people as they left, and Rick introduced her at every table with a possessive hand at the small of her back. There were flashbulbs outside the restaurant; he had warned her before they arrived that the paparazzi liked to camp on that stretch of sidewalk, so at least she was prepared this time. Their car service was waiting at the curb, though, so at least they didn’t have to stand there and put up with it while waiting for a taxi.

Arriving home, they all went upstairs to change before coming back down for the evening’s movie – Alexis had chosen _Dangerous Liaisons_. Having seen the movie three times already, Kate ended up dozing off on Rick’s shoulder about halfway through, not waking until the credits were rolling and Alexis was carrying the popcorn bowls back to the kitchen. “Oh, I missed it,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Rick replied softly, kissing her temple and brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. “It was just as bad as it’s always been.”

Kate laughed as she unfolded herself from the couch and stood, stretching, then moved to the kitchen to help Alexis clean up. Once that was done, the girl yawned hugely. “I’m exhausted,” she declared, “and I have to study tomorrow. So I’m going to bed.”

Rick came over to hug Alexis. “Sleep tight.”

“You, too.” Alexis paused, as though considering, and then moved to hug Kate as well. “Good night.”

“Good night, sweetie,” Kate replied, smiling. She watched as Alexis mounted the steps and disappeared into her room, then moved into Rick’s arms. “You ready for bed, too?”

“Definitely,” he replied, his voice dropping slightly. “But not sleep.” He bent his head to kiss her thoroughly. “You looked absolutely sinful tonight,” he murmured against her skin, his lips slowly moving up her neck to nuzzle behind her ear. “It was all I could do to keep my hands off you at the table.”

She laughed softly, leaning to press a slow kiss to his pulse point. “I noticed. You were very touchy tonight.”

“I couldn’t help it. You just have that effect on me.” He took her hands, drawing her out of the kitchen and up the stairs.

“Your water bill is going to be ridiculous this month,” Kate commented as she stepped into the shower with him a few minutes later.

“I don’t care,” he replied, bending to kiss her breathless. “It’ll be worth it.” His hands quested down her body, seeking all the places that made her gasp and whimper and moan, before sliding between her legs to check her readiness. She was slick and hot already and he turned her in his arms, holding her back against his chest as his fingers rubbed and teased her clit.

Her fingers clenched the arm around her torso, her head falling back against his shoulder. “Jesus. Yeah, Rick, yeah, just like that, oh God, yes, touch me there. Yes.” Her hips thrust forward, seeking his fingers, and he chuckled and nipped her earlobe.

“That’s right,” he whispered into her ear, his fingers working furiously. “I’ve got you. You know I’ve got you.”

“Yes,” she whispered back. “Yes, yes, yes, oh, fuck, Rick, yes!” Her voice, which had gotten progressively louder with each word, rang out into the bathroom as she came, shuddering in his arms. Her legs gave out, but he held her up, his lips gentle on her neck and his fingers soothing as he stroked her skin gently. In just a moment, she had the use of her legs back, and when she was able to stand, he guided her gently forward to lean against the wall.

The water ran hot down her back and he bent, pressing his tongue against the base of her spine and running it up to the back of her neck, where he kissed her, biting down gently to avoid leaving a new bruise. She rolled her hips back against him, impatient, and he chuckled, reaching up into the shower caddy for a condom. Just a moment later, he was pressing into her, her back arching to grant him better access. “Oh, God, Kate,” he whispered, leaning to press his forehead against the top of her head. “God, baby, you feel so good.”

“Please, Rick,” she whispered against the tile. “Please, I need you.”

“You have me,” he murmured back, resting his left hand on her hip. His right hand he raised, laying it over hers where she was braced against the wall. His fingers interlaced themselves with hers, the diamond ring still on her hand. “You have me, Kate.” With those words, he began to thrust, moving slowly and pushing in as deep as he could reach. Her fingers clawed against the tile, her head bowing, her back arching even further, and he pushed in harder, loving the way she gasped and moaned and cried out and begged. And then, quite suddenly, she came again, crying out and clenching around him, and he came as well, moaning her name into her back.

They stayed there in the shower for a few more minutes, letting the water rinse them clean, before he shut it off and drew her out, gently toweling her dry before withdrawing into the bedroom to turn the sheets back. She came out a few minutes later, wearing something blue and lacy that hugged her curves beautifully, and he grinned, sitting down on the bed and reaching for her. She curled up in his arms, holding him tightly as he pulled the sheet up over their bodies.

Neither of them spoke for a long time, but she knew he was still awake because his hand was drawing aimless patterns on the skin of her back. His words were echoing in Kate’s mind: _“I’ve got you. You have me.”_ And chasing them was what Alexis had said: _“Sometimes they’ve been picking the wrong people.”_ Was it possible that she was the right person? Clearly Alexis seemed to think so. And judging from what had been said on Sunday, Kate thought perhaps Martha did as well.

Was it worth the risk? This had the potential to end extremely badly, but it also had the potential to become something truly amazing. If Kate was being honest, it already _was_ something amazing. And Alexis was right – Kate was scared. She was scared of screwing things up, but she was also scared of what might happen if she didn’t.

She raised her head finally, lifting up on one elbow to study his face. He watched her in return, serious as he could see that she was serious. She could see him clearly in the light streaming in from the window, and she studied his eyes, those so-open windows into his soul. She could see in them everything that he was and everything that she wanted, and finally she took a deep breath, her heart in her throat, and she spoke.

“I love you.”

He smiled, the hand on her back coming up to cup her cheek. “I know,” he said softly. “I love you, too.”


	8. Squeeze

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The European press tour begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> for the Bugg, who pestered me to get this done.

When the door opened on their hotel suite in London’s Dorchester Hotel, the bellman stepped back and Rick gestured for Kate to precede him in. She took three steps into the room and stopped, staring in awe. Behind her, Rick chuckled softly and gently pushed her forward so that the bellman could bring in their bags. “This is amazing,” she whispered, crossing the room in several quick steps to peer out the window. “Rick… this is…”

“It’s a fantastic hotel, I know,” he replied, grinning, as he came over to wrap his arms around her waist. “The view’s pretty good, and the service is outstanding.”

“Thank you, sir,” the bellman replied, grinning, as he offloaded the last of their bags. “Anything else for you just now?”

“No, thank you,” Rick replied, moving to tip the young man. The man tipped his hat once and left the room unobtrusively, pushing the luggage cart before himself and shutting the door behind him. Rick turned back to Kate. “Are you hungry at all? Their afternoon tea starts in an hour. It’s actually won awards.”

She turned toward him, her eyes smoky. “An hour, huh?”

He grinned. “Yep.”

“Well,” she said, strolling toward him, that sexy swing in her hips, “that’s just enough time.”

He captured her lips with his when she came close enough, and she leaned into him the way he loved, her hands catching his shoulders and her body pressing against his from breasts to hips. “Just enough time for what?” he teased, his voice low against the side of her neck.

“Just enough time,” she murmured, her hands sliding down across his chest, “for me to get revenge on you for being such a total bastard on the flight.” She pushed him away, just hard enough that he stumbled back a step, and she grabbed her makeup bag off the top of the stack of luggage. With a silvery laugh trailing behind her, she darted through the bedroom and into the bathroom with him hot on her heels, pushing the door shut in his face and locking it behind her.

Her laugh mocked him from the other side of the door as he slumped against it, defeated. “Kaaaaate,” he called out, but she only laughed more before turning on the water in the tub.

“Ooh,” he heard her say over the sound of the plumbing. “It’s a Jacuzzi tub.”

“You’re evil,” he accused the door. Then, shaking his head and grinning, he headed back out into the main room to start sorting out their luggage.

When Kate left the bathroom half an hour or so later, Rick had already put away all of their belongings and installed himself with his laptop at the big mahogany desk. She moved quietly through the suite, as he was clearly writing and she didn't want to distract him. After dressing in a light, floral-print dress and a pair of sandals - utterly impractical clothing of a type she seldom wore in New York - she grabbed her new book and moved into the room with him, settling herself on the sofa and flipping it open. It was the new James Patterson - Rick had convinced Patterson to let Kate read the advance copy - and within five pages, she was engrossed in the newest adventure of Alex Cross. The staccato ticking of Rick's fingers on his keyboard provided a soothing background, but it seemed that she'd barely gotten into the story before he was touching her shoulder, bringing her gently out of her book-trance. "Did you want to go to tea?" he asked. "Or would you rather stay here and read?"

It was a tough choice, and judging by the faint smile on his face, he knew it. She bit her lip, considering, but eventually slipped a bookmark into the book and set it aside. "I can always read in bed later," she said, grinning as she took his hand and let him help her stand.

He laughed, leaning down to playfully monster her neck. She squealed, trying to pull away, but he wrapped his arms around her and held her close, kissing her gently. "By the time you get to bed tonight, you'll be so exhausted you're not going to want to read."

She raised an eyebrow. "You sound pretty sure of yourself."

"That's not what I mean," he replied, grinning. "We've got a press function tonight, and I guarantee you that they're going to want to see as much if not more of you than me."

She sighed. "They don't want me. They want Nikki Heat."

"To them, you _are_ Nikki Heat." He wrapped an arm around her waist as he led her from the suite. "Besides, you're not _just_ Nikki Heat any more." He took her right hand, holding it up so that she could look at the diamond that had been on it for over a month. "You're also the girl who snagged Rick Castle."

"Oh, that just makes things so much better," Kate replied, rolling her eyes.

He tweaked her skirt as they entered the elevator. "So cynical."

"I get that way when I'm unfed."

"Well, by all means, let's get some food into you. I like you much better when you're fed." He let his hand trail down to rest lightly on the swell of her rump. "It improves the view, as well."

She swatted at him. "Quit. Jerk."

He grinned, leaning down to kiss her lips. "Love you," he whispered, just to watch her melt.

She did, her eyes going limpid and her lips curving into a gentle smile, her hand coming up to touch his cheek and her thumb tracing a soft line up his cheekbone. "Love you, too."

He wrapped his arm around her again, pulling her close, and when the elevator doors opened, he drew her out, heading toward the tearoom. They were joined about halfway through their meal by Rick's agent, Paula, who was dressed as usual in an outrageously low-cut dress and heels so high she was almost as tall as he was. "There you are," she exclaimed, seating herself at their table without even asking. "You ready for tonight?"

"Paula, how nice to see you, please take a seat," Rick replied dryly. "Of course I'm ready."

"Yeah, I know that; I wasn't talking to you." She pinned Kate with a significant look. "Are you on script?"

Kate blinked, taken aback, and glanced at Rick before answering. "Um... I don't have a script."

Paula rounded on Rick. "You didn't put her on script?"

"I don't have to put her on script," Rick replied, his eyes narrowing. "She doesn't need one. She's not Gina."

"Excuse me." Kate's frosty voice cut across the developing argument. "What exactly are you two talking about?"

Rick sighed. "She wants me to tell you that you have to be careful to stay completely positive when you answer questions," he admitted. "And to make sure you know that you don't talk about the book - leave that to me - and don't let them get under your skin."

"I know all that," Kate replied, her voice slightly sharp.

Paula waved a hand. "So does Gina, but you shoulda heard some of what she said at _her_ first press event." She shook her head. "It took me _weeks_ to kill some of the rumors she started."

"Mother still thinks she did most of that deliberately." Rick shrugged slightly. "She's probably right."

"And she was used to publicity," Paula pointed out. "Your girl here's used to saying 'no comment' as she pushes past the cameras to get to the murder scene." The publicist leaned back in her chair, crossing her legs. "Are you pregnant?"

Kate blinked. "What? No."

"Why not?"

"What business is it of yours?"

"It's not," Paula replied, leaning forward. "But it's the first thing the reporters are gonna ask you. Are you having kids, don't you wanna have kids, doesn't he wanna have more kids, are you trying to have kids, when are you gonna get married, why are you wearing that rock on your right hand, oh and by the way, what's it like to have Richard Castle on tap whenever you want him. They're gonna ask you stuff that's invasive, personal and uncomfortable. And your job is to keep a smile on your face the whole time and not let on how much they're pissing you off."

Not for the first time, Kate got very nervous about the upcoming event. She swallowed hard and turned to Rick. "Maybe I should just stay upstairs," she said softly. "I don't want to do something stupid and have you end up with a bunch of bad press over your ill-behaved girlfriend."

"It's up to you," he replied, laying his hand on hers and squeezing it warmly. "If you don't want to do it, don't. But don't skip out on it just because you're worried about bad press. I am absolutely not worried about anything you might say."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. Listen, we'll stay close together, and if they ask you something you don't want to answer, you can pass the question to me and I'll field it. Okay?"

She considered this option for a long time, obviously weighing it against the more attractive choice of staying upstairs with her new book, and finally nodded. "Okay."

Rick turned to Paula. "Satisfied?"

"No. But I suppose it'll have to do. Gina called, by the way. She's gonna meet us in Paris."

"That's really not necessary." Rick's voice was flat.

Paula shrugged. "What am I gonna do, tell your publisher not to show up at a publicity event?"

"What am I paying you for?" Rick leaned back in his chair and sighed. "I need a new publisher."

"I heard Random House might be interested, once your current contract runs out."

"Find out," Rick said flatly. He glanced over at Kate. "Still hungry?"

She shook her head. "Mm-mmm."

He stood, holding her chair as she stood as well. "We'll see you at seven, Paula."

"Don't be late this time, hmm?" Paula reached across the table for an uneaten watercress sandwich. Rick, rolling his eyes, led Kate away.

She was surprised when they passed the elevator and headed for the front doors. "Where are we going?"

"I need to get out of the hotel for awhile." He stood on the sidewalk for a second, looking around, then smiled, tucking her hand into the crook of his elbow. "Come on." They crossed the street, making their way into Hyde Park.

They strolled along together, breathing deeply of the early evening air and simply enjoying being together. As the sun sank down, Rick found a park bench and seated himself, drawing her down to perch on his knee. She leaned against him, her head resting on his shoulder, and he held her tightly, both of them watching the sun set and reveling in being together. Her arms wrapped loosely around his waist; his right hand rested on her knee while his left stroked her back soothingly. After some time, she spoke. "I love you."

He smiled. "I love you, too."

She took a deep breath. "Sometimes I think I don't say it enough."

"Enough for whom?" he asked her softly. "For me, or for you?"

She gave a soft chuckle. "I think I could say it every five minutes and it wouldn't be enough for you."

"That's where you're wrong," he contradicted her, hugging her. "All I have to do is close my eyes, Kate, and I can see your face and hear your voice when you told me the first time. I won't ever forget that." He turned his head slightly, brushing his lips against her forehead. "But I don't need to hear it. Even when you don't say it, you show me every day. I feel it when you touch me." His hand came up, cupping her cheek. "I see it in your eyes when you look at me; I hear it in your voice when you say my name." He leaned, kissing her lips warmly. "I know, Kate."

Kate smiled, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears. "You have such poetry inside you," she whispered. "I forget sometimes."

Rick kissed her again. "Only because you inspire it in me," he whispered back. "I love you, Kate."

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, resting her forehead against his neck. "So much." Her breath brushed his neck, the words almost inaudible against his skin, but he held her even tighter. This, he knew, was what he'd been dreaming of.

Seven o'clock found the two of them in the Dorchester's ballroom, Rick in an impeccable black suit and Kate in a green Versace dress, snuggled together on a couch and waiting for the guests to begin arriving. Paula was flitting around taking care of last-minute arrangements when the doors opened and the first few guests began to trickle in. The press was scheduled to have unfettered access to them for the first fifteen minutes; after that, three reporters had been granted fifteen minutes each. After that, the press would be removed from the hotel, though they were welcome to hang about outside and ask questions of anyone they could get to stand still long enough.

Kate's stomach was in a knot as the first reporters approached them, but Rick squeezed her hand and gave her a smile, and she took a deep breath, trying to relax. It helped that the reporters approached them with smiles and greeted them politely. The first fifteen minutes went by quickly, and Kate was pleasantly surprised to note that none of the reporters actually asked any of the invasive questions Paula had warned her about. They asked, instead, about her work as a homicide detective, her outside interests, and similar topics. One did ask her, with a sly grin, if she'd been a fan of Rick's work before she met him. She admitted that she had, with a self-deprecating smile, and Rick reached out to squeeze her hand, giving her a quick grin.

The first two of the fifteen-minute interviews went well also; those reporters were also polite and helped put Kate at her ease. By the time the third one arrived, Kate was feeling confident in her ability to handle the press, and wondering why Paula had tried so hard to scare her earlier that afternoon. Then the third reporter walked in, sat down, and pinned her with his watery green eyes.  
"James." Rick glanced at Kate. "Kate, this is James Robbins, from the _Daily Mirror_."

"How nice to meet you," Kate murmured, shaking Robbins's offered hand. It was clear from the expression on Rick's face that he didn't care very much for Robbins, so Kate wasn't completely blindsided by the first question out of the reporter's mouth.

"Miss Beckett, you've been working with Mr. Castle for almost two years now. Will that work relationship continue now that you're about to become the third Mrs. Castle?"

Kate's eyes narrowed. "We haven't really discussed it, but I don't see any reason why it shouldn't. We're both professional adults and we're able to separate our work relationship from our personal relationship."

"I see." Robbins wrote something on his notepad and glanced up at her again. "Being a police officer, though, that's difficult work. Stressful. You don't think it might cause problems, having your, er, lover shadowing you when you're chasing criminals?"

"Not especially," Kate replied, her voice growing cool. "As I said, we're both professional adults."

"And what do your co-workers think about your tendency to mix business with pleasure?"

Rick opened his mouth to intervene, but Kate beat him to the punch. She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, pinning Robbins with her best interrogation-room glare. "What exactly are you trying to imply, Mr. Robbins?"

"Why, nothing, Miss Beckett. I'm merely asking questions, the answers to which I believe our readers will be interested in."

Kate laughed softly. "Mr. Robbins, I've read your paper. The average _Daily Mirror_ reader would care more about whether or not I'm secretly a killer cyborg than whether or not I take my boyfriend along with me to work. So what is it you really want to know?"

Robbins leaned forward as well, his watery eyes roving up and down Kate's form. "When did you start sleeping together, Miss Beckett?"

"That's none of your business."

"He's been deeply involved in many of your cases. Perhaps your little attachment has allowed you to give more weight to the opinions of an untrained civilian than is strictly necessary. I think it's important to know whether or not your procedure has been affected by his presence."

"And you honestly think no cross-examining defense attorney has ever asked me that on the stand?" Kate laughed again, but there was no humor in the sound. "Really, Mr. Robbins. You're an idiot." She sat back and picked up her drink. "I'm through talking to you."

Robbins turned his gaze then to Rick, whose expression was black with anger. Seemingly oblivious, he spoke. "Mr. Castle -"

"No." Rick's single word was spoken low, but in a tone that vibrated with fury. "This interview is over. Get out."

Robbins glanced at his watch. "I was promised a full fifteen minutes."

Rick raised a hand. A moment later, an extremely large specimen of male was standing on either side of Robbins. "Mr. Robbins has once again proved himself offensive," Rick said simply. "Please remove him."

The one on Robbins's left looked down at him. "Time to go, Mr. Robbins. You can either get up and walk, or Mr. Keegan and I can carry you out."

Robbins studied Rick for a moment, then stood and brushed an imaginary speck off the leg of his slacks. "Very well, Mr. Castle."

He left, accompanied by the bodyguards. Rick leaned back as well, wrapping an arm around Kate. "You handled that really well."

Kate smiled slightly. "I've had worse grillings on the stand. Honestly, I don't know what I was so worried about. That was nothing."

Paula floated over, clearly enjoying herself. "How'd the interviews go?"

" _Daily Mirror_ 's going to need cleaning up after," Rick replied. "He got nasty with Kate and we threw him out."

"What? Rick!"

"Paula, I told you, I'm not going to put up with it. I won't have Kate feeling like she's under siege from the press." He paused. "Besides, I've also told you I don't want to deal with James Robbins."

Paula stopped. "They sent Robbins?"

"They sent Robbins."

She reached into her handbag and pulled out her cell phone, dialing a number. She waited for an answer, and spoke without a greeting. "What the hell did you send Robbins down here for? You know how Mr. Castle feels about him." There was a pause, and then she said, "Well, he's who showed up. Whatever he writes, you don't run it. You run _anything_ with a Robbins byline that even mentions Mr. Castle or Ms. Beckett, I swear to God, Marks, we'll own your rag." She snapped the phone closed and looked back at Rick. "He didn't send Robbins. He sent somebody else. He thinks Robbins maybe traded off; he was supposed to cover some theatre thing on the West End tonight." She shook her head. "Bastard." Then she flitted away again, heading for the bar.

Rick sighed, leaning to kiss Kate's temple. "And just think, my ex-wife will be joining us in Paris."

"Oh," Kate murmured, her voice dry. "I can't wait."

Laughing, Rick kissed her again, then stood, taking her hand. "Come on," he said, drawing her to her feet. "Let's dance."

They kept each other on the dance floor most of the night, correctly intuiting that as long as they were wrapped in each other's arms and swaying to music, no one would bother them with petty questions or demands. Required to socialize at least some of the time, Rick led Kate through a whirlwind tour of the room around midnight, introducing her to everyone who was there as if she was supposed to remember who they all were. By twelve-thirty, they were back on the dance floor, once again totally engrossed in one another.

A little after three, footsore and giddy with champagne, they made their way back to their room. Kate shimmied out of the expensive dress and let Castle return it to its garment bag while she went into the bathroom to wash her face and take her nightly birth control pill. When she came back out, he took her in his arms and held her close. “You were great tonight,” he whispered. “I never would have known you were brand new to this.”

She chuckled against his shoulder as his hands smoothed over the silk of her blue negligee. “Well, I do have a lot of experience with saying ‘no comment’ on my way to the murder scene.”

Rick laughed, leaning down to kiss her gently. “And it served you well today.” He wrapped his arms all the way around her and squeezed, hugging her close. “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she murmured, pressing a kiss to his pectoral. With a sexy grin, she added, “Now take me to bed; I wanna see if it’s any different in a foreign country.”

He laughed and drew her with him toward the huge bed that dominated the room, his hands sliding down her body and then back up, bringing the negligee up over her head. He dropped it on the floor and left it there, his head bending and his mouth touching her neck and then ghosting along her shoulder. He sat down on the edge of the bed, drawing her to stand between his knees, and bent his head to her breasts, lovingly suckling at each one until her fingers were buried in his hair, her breath washing across the top of his head each time she whispered his name.

His fingers delved between her thighs, slipped inside her body. Her hips bucked toward him and her whispers became higher pitched, her fingers gently clawing at the back of his neck as he worked her skillfully, using all his knowledge of her body to bring her swiftly to orgasm. Then he drew her onto his lap, cradling her against him like something precious that he might break.

When she got her breath back, she leaned up to kiss him and shifted her weight forward, rolling him onto his back on the bed. Then she straddled his torso, her mouth still fused to his, as he struggled to slip his boxers off and kick them onto the floor. His hands, once unoccupied, gripped her ass, kneading her flesh, and she grinned into their kisses before slowly moving backward.

He lay there, grinning up at her, as she positioned herself above him, reaching down to grip his shaft. She sank down onto him and he groaned softly, the sound entwining with her own whimper of pleasure. Then he sat up, holding her in his lap, and nuzzled his face into the crook of her neck. “I love you, Kate,” he whispered, one hand wrapping around her waist and the other sliding up into her hair. “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too,” she assured him, her fingers threading through his hair. “I do, Rick.”

He shifted slightly, raising himself up off the bed just a fraction. “Put your legs around my waist.”

It took a second, but she shifted from a kneeling position to sitting, her legs wrapped tightly around Rick’s torso. He sat back down on the bed again, holding her tight. He didn’t move, didn’t thrust; he merely sat, buried deep inside her, holding her. He drew her head down to rest on his shoulder and he snugged his forehead against her neck.

It was the closest Kate thought she might ever come to being physically a part of someone else. Every time he breathed, every time he moved, she felt it all the way through her body. She had never felt anything like it before. The connection between the two of them was intensified a hundredfold, the usual fire between them turned up to eleven. And then he started moving.

He didn’t thrust, exactly; it was more that he tightened his grip on her and pulled her closer, so that his cock buried inside her went even deeper. She whimpered and tried to squirm, but he was holding her so tightly that she couldn’t. What she could do, she discovered by accident, was squeeze.

Her arms went around his shoulders and her legs tightened around his waist, and every time he released, she gripped with her limbs and with her inner muscles. “Oh yeah,” he whispered into her ear as she slipped into the rhythm he’d set. “Yeah, that’s it, now you’re catching on.”

She whined against his neck. “Rick. Please. So good, Rick.”

“That’s right, baby,” he murmured, his hands rubbing her back. “That’s right. I’ve got you. God, I love you so much.”

She had no idea how long they stayed there, squeezing and releasing and shifting and murmuring their love for each other, letting the passion build and build and build until, beyond coherency, she strained against him, her movements becoming jerky and her soft cries more and more needy. He reached up, nearly past sense himself, and unhooked one of her hands from around his shoulders, drawing it down between their bodies. “Touch yourself,” he whispered. “Let me see how you touch yourself.”

Her hand moved immediately, and he arched himself back slightly, giving her enough room to reach and himself enough room to watch as her fingers plunged between their bodies, finding her clit and working it furiously. She leaned back a little farther, her other hand still gripping his neck, and he supported her with his arms, unable to take his eyes off the place where they were joined. The sight of her touching herself was beautiful, and when she came, her cries matched the pulsating rhythm of her inner walls.

He stood, still holding her tight, and turned, laying her back on the bed and leaning over her. He kissed her slightly-open mouth gently and then he planted his palms on the mattress on either side of her head. He thrust, and thrust, and thrust again, and she whispered words of encouragement from underneath him, her voice wrapping around his mind as he surged forward, pushing into her more deeply than she thought he ever had before. And then, suddenly, he came, groaning his love for her against her shoulder.

A little later, they lay together under the sheet, Kate sprawled half across him in her favorite position. Rick stroked her hair gently, considering, and then smiled into the darkness of the bedroom. “So,” he asked her, “was it better?” She looked up at him, confused, and he clarified. “Sex in a foreign country.”

Kate laughed then and kissed his chest. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “We’ll have to do it again tomorrow so I can double-check.”


	9. Sightseeing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A book signing and some exploration

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks go out once again to my excellent beta, [Secondalto](http://archiveofourown.org/users/secondalto/pseuds/secondalto), and to everyone who has been patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for this chapter.

When Kate woke, Rick was gone. She hadn’t actually anticipated that; she was ordinarily an early riser, and she had never dreamed he would be able to get up, shower, dress and leave without waking her. But he had; the bedside clock read 10:43, which meant he had been at his book signing for very nearly two hours and had another two to go. She stretched luxuriously and considered her options for the morning.

She could go back to sleep; there was something temptingly decadent about spending all morning in bed and still being there, warm and sleep-rumpled, when he got back. If she took that route, she could probably induce him to spend the rest of the day in bed with her, as well. She could order room service and sit on the balcony all day, reading her new James Patterson novel; Patterson would want to know, when they got home, what she’d thought of it. She could order room service and sit in the Jacuzzi tub with her new Patterson novel; that was another attractive idea. In the end, though, she did none of those things; instead, she hauled herself out of bed and stumbled into the shower, emerging some time later with clear eyes and a plan.

She did order room service; she was starving and didn’t want to wait until after the book signing to eat. A cup of tea and a coddled egg on toast would tide her over nicely until Rick was free to go and have a real lunch with her. While she waited for the food to arrive, she fixed her hair and pulled on a comfortable pair of jeans. She was leaning over the bathroom counter putting on her makeup when a young woman arrived with her food; they exchanged polite greetings while Kate signed the bill, and then the young woman left again. Kate finished her makeup, ate quickly, and then pulled on a cashmere sweater that turned her eyes a deep golden color. A pair of comfortable walking shoes finished the outfit, and she grabbed her purse on her way out the door.

She thought about using public transportation; she’d always wanted to ride on one of those double-decker buses. She opted for a taxi, though, as being faster. The fact that it would save the buses to be experienced with Rick was also a factor in her decision, and she smiled as she told the taxi driver where she wanted to go.

Waterstone’s Booksellers was fairly close to the hotel; it was a matter of a few minutes’ drive before the taxi was letting her out in front of the store. She paused, slightly daunted, as she took in the line of fans which was wrapped around the building, and suddenly felt very appreciative of the laminated card Paula had given her the previous day. Rick had referred to it as her backstage pass, and she’d rolled her eyes, but now she was glad to have it. She showed it to the security guard, and he pushed the door open for her with a smile. “Just to the back, Miss,” he told her, pointing, his voice full with the lilting tones of a Highland Scot. “Ye can follow the line, aye?”

“Thank you,” she said, smiling back, and proceeded to do just that, making her way through the store, her eyes alight with anticipation. As the line rounded a display of cookbooks, she saw him: he was sitting behind a table, Paula on his left and an empty chair on his right. There were a few more security guards standing around to make sure none of the fans got unruly, and Kate showed her pass to the closest one of these. He glanced at it, nodded and smiled, and she slipped past him, coming around behind Rick and slipping into the empty chair. “Hey,” she said softly.

He paused in the act of signing the book in front of him. “Hey,” he replied, smiling broadly. “You’re up.” He finished the book, handing it back to the woman in front of him with a smile, and she went away, the next fan stepping up.

“I am.” Kate leaned around him. “Hi, Paula.”

“Hey,” Paula greeted her. “There’s coffee if you want it.”

“Where?” Kate started to rise again, but Paula waved a hand at her.

“No, no, that’s not how this works. Rick, you’re gonna have to teach this girl how to be a celebrity.” Paula turned, gesturing, and a young man with a shop employee’s nametag bustled up. “What kind of coffee do you want, Katie? They’ve got a Starbucks back there.”

“Grande skim latte,” Castle recited, winking up at the fan in front of him. “Two pumps sugar-free vanilla. And a bearclaw.”

Paula raised an eyebrow. Kate rolled her eyes. “Actually… I’m on vacation. Venti mocha. Iced, please.”

“Of course,” the young man replied, smiling, and he scurried away.

Kate turned back and settled in her chair, watching as Castle signed and smiled and chatted with fans. Her mocha appeared at her side as if by magic and she sipped at it, watching for a few more minutes, before offering her opinion. “Do you feel like you’re on an assembly line?”

Castle laughed, as did the fans in line who overheard. “I do, sometimes,” he admitted. “But it’s not all bad. Sure, I won’t be able to feel my fingers by the end of the day, but I’ll have all these ink spots all over me to make up for it.”

Kate laughed softly, then fell silent again, not wanting to distract him as he chatted briefly with each person. She smiled slightly, watching them come and go, and thought about the time she’d stood in line for two hours just to get his signature, as these people all were. She remembered it as though it had just been yesterday; Paula had been sitting on his left, just as she was now; on his right, in a blue shirt and a denim skirt, had been Alexis, reading what was probably a textbook. Of course, at the time, Kate hadn’t known who Paula and Alexis were, and had really only had eyes for the man in the middle, but she remembered them anyway.

She remembered finally getting to the front of the line, and the thrill she’d felt when he looked up at her, smiled and asked her name. She’d given it, and he’d asked how she liked the book. Very much, she’d said truthfully, and he’d smiled again and said he was glad she enjoyed it. Then he’d given her the book back, and she’d hugged it to her chest and smiled again, wishing she had something witty or cool or memorable to say, but in the end she’d just whispered her thanks and vanished into the crowd.

Once or twice, both during and since the Tisdale case, she’d wondered if he would ever remember signing her book. At first, she had feared that he would; the teasing would never stop if he knew about that. She’d hidden the signed book under her mattress on the off chance that he might come over and somehow find it. Now, though, having seen what book signings were like and knowing just how many fans he dealt with on a day to day basis, she knew that the chances of him remembering that two-minute encounter were so slim as to be nonexistent.

She was okay with that; it was enough for her to treasure that memory for herself. With a slight smile, she stood, touching his shoulder briefly. “Be right back.”

He nodded at her and she slipped away, making her way through the store. She paused here and there, looking at books, and finally found one that caught her eye. She paid for it, then headed back to the table again. She would have liked to claim one of the comfortable-looking seats not far away, but the whole point of coming to the store was to be there for him, and so she settled herself in the straight-backed chair on his right and opened her new book.

He paused between autographs to peek at what she was reading. “Dan Brown? You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“What?” Kate asked, defensive. “I liked _The DaVinci Code_.”

“He’s a – ” The beginnings of what was obviously going to be a diatribe was stopped by Paula’s hand clamping down over Rick’s mouth.

“Shut up unless you want whatever you were about to say to be on the cover of the Times tomorrow,” Paula warned him.

Rick blew a puff of air out through his nose as she released him, then pointed a finger at Kate. “This discussion is not over.”

“That’s what _you_ think,” Kate replied, returning to her book.

At last, the line of fans petered out, and the only people still around were store employees who were setting the area to rights in the aftermath of the event. Rick sat back with a sigh, rubbing at his wrist, and Kate put her book aside, taking his hand in hers and massaging it gently. “Hurt pretty bad?”

He shrugged. “No more than usual. I don’t like doing these long signings; a couple hours is usually my max. But I don’t get to Europe much, so I try to do longer ones and give more people a chance to get their book signed.”

Kate nodded. “And you’re doing this again tomorrow?”

“Yep. In fact, almost every day from now until we get back to New York.”

She made a sympathetic face. “We’ll need to pick up some massage oil.”

He grinned. “Only if you promise to let me use it on you.”

“If you two are gonna start flirting, I’m out of here,” Paula declared, standing. “Rick, are we on for dinner tonight?”

Rick paused. “Were we supposed to be?”

“No. That’s why I’m asking.”

“Oh.” He looked distinctly relieved. “Then no, sorry; Kate and I have reservations.”

Kate blinked. “We do?”

Rick grinned. “Yes, we do.” He gripped her hands with his and stood, pulling her up with him. “Bring your trashy novel; we’ve got places to go.”

“Castle, now is not the time for you to start making fun of my taste in literature.”

“Dan Brown is not literature.”

Paula watched them go, shaking her head. She really needed to get off her ass and start drafting the engagement announcement; she had a feeling she was going to need it soon. At least, she mused to herself as she gathered her things, this one wasn’t likely to turn out like the last two.

On the sidewalk, Rick wrapped his arm around Kate’s waist. “What do you want to do first?”

Kate shrugged slightly. “I’ve never been to London,” she admitted. “What do you think we should do?”

“Hmm.” He leaned down to kiss her gently. “How about the touristy stuff? Tower of London, Buckingham Palace?”

“Sounds like fun,” Kate approved. “Can we take the bus?”

He studied her for a second, then grinned. “Of course.” He led her down the sidewalk to a bus stop, where they waited, chatting quietly about the morning’s event. When the bus arrived, he led her onto the upper deck. They seated themselves near the back and Kate snuggled under his arm, watching the city pass them. Then, smiling wickedly, she leaned up and kissed him.

“Aha,” he said when she released his lips. “I knew you just wanted to make out on the upper deck.” They shared a grin, and then his hand came up to cup her jaw, sliding back into her hair as he leaned down again, capturing her lips with his. His tongue traced her lower lip for a long moment before sliding into her mouth, and she wrapped her arms around him, moaning softly into his kiss. The world around them seemed to fall away, and they were only brought back to it by the sound of a Cockney voice behind them.

“Hey, mate,” a man was saying to Rick. “’Eard you say as you was gettin’ orf at Buckingham Palace. Gonna miss your stop.”

Rick slowly released Kate, smiling down into her face, then turned and nodded at the man, who was grinning at them. “Thanks.”

“Sure fing, mate,” the man replied, settling back into his seat as the bus came to a stop.

He led her from the bus stop to the street corner, then paused, looking around. “Are you hungry?”

“I had a little breakfast at the hotel,” Kate confessed, “but I could have a salad or something if you want to eat.”

“I’m starving,” he admitted, “and our reservations aren’t until seven. Come on; there used to be a great little café about three blocks or so from here. Let’s see if it’s still there.”

It was in fact still there, and they sat at a tiny outside table to eat. It was nice, Kate reflected, being able to sit outside without having to worry about paparazzi and random fans. Rick’s books were popular worldwide, but it was easier to be anonymous in a city they didn’t live in. She could sit close to him, let him hold her hand or lean in and kiss her without wondering if they would be on the cover of Page Six the next day. When they left the café, she was smiling.

He drew her close to him, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, as they headed back up the street; she was looking straight ahead and nearly tripped when he suddenly changed their direction. “Rick?”

“You mentioned massage oil?”

“Yeah, for your – Castle, no.”

He grinned down at her. “Come on. It’ll be fun. Besides, it’s not like you’ve never been in a sex shop before. You were clearly fairly familiar with the layout of the one we went to during the bondage case.”

“Sure, from busting them when I was in Vice!” she protested as he gently tugged her toward the shop’s door.

He pulled her close to him, looking down into her eyes. “If this honestly makes you uncomfortable, we won’t go in.”

Kate studied his face. She could see that he really wanted to go into the store – whether from a childish glee at the idea of being in a sex-toy shop or for some other reason, she wasn’t sure. But his desire was obvious. She considered the idea. It wouldn’t hurt, really, to go in, and she could always put her foot down if he tried to buy something ridiculous or exotic. She bit her lip and sighed. “All right. Let’s go.”

He leaned down to kiss her lips gently. “I love you.”

She gave him a half-hearted glare. “Don’t think this means I’m gonna let you try anything shady.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he replied, grinning widely and kissing her again. Then he took her hand and led her into the store.

There was a display of massage oils close to the front door, and Kate went there first, picking through the selection for a scent she wouldn’t mind having all over both of them. She eventually settled on a gentle incense that reminded her vaguely of nag champa, then turned, looking for Rick. He was on the other side of the store with a salesclerk, looking at a display. She couldn’t see what they were looking at, but she was fairly sure he was wasting his money. Kate wasn’t a prude and she certainly enjoyed sex, especially sex with Rick, but she wasn’t particularly interested in kinky sex-toy games.

She made her way to the counter and paid for the oil she’d picked out, wandering back toward the door and glancing idly through the racks of oils and lubricants while she waited for Rick to get it out of his system. The fact that he had a bag in his hand when he appeared at her side was not a surprise to her; she merely rolled her eyes and led the way out onto the street. She started to make a comment about whatever he’d purchased, but changed her mind; it would be better not to acknowledge it at all. Instead, she let him take her hand and lead her back toward the main street and the palace.

They watched the changing of the guard, which was highly entertaining, but palace tours were unavailable, so they caught another bus and made their way to the Tower of London, and from there to Trafalgar Square. As the sun sank below the horizon, he kissed her there, under the disapproving glare of Lord Nelson himself, and then he took her back to the hotel to get ready for dinner.

Their reservations, it turned out, were at the Ritz, so Kate donned her favorite little black dress and the jewelry Rick had bought for her at Tiffany’s. She put her hair up in a French twist, making sure to dangle a few curls enticingly around her neck, and dusted on her makeup, darkening her eyes to a smoky hue. When she came out of the bathroom, he was waiting for her, and he stood, staring at her in awe. “You look amazing,” he whispered, coming to kiss her. “Absolutely stunning.”

“You’re not so bad yourself, you know,” she teased, stroking one hand down the front of his suit jacket. “Ready to go?”

“I was thinking maybe we could stay in and order room service instead,” he suggested, one hand sliding from her shoulder down to her hip and squeezing enticingly.

“Not a chance,” she replied, grinning. “I spent too long getting ready to not show it off.”

“Oh, fine,” he said in an aggrieved tone. “If we must.”

She leaned in and kissed him. “I’ll make it up to you when we get back.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” he replied, grinning, and opened the door for her.

There were several glasses of wine at dinner, and when they returned to the hotel room, there was a bottle of champagne chilling by the desk. Rick opened it and poured them each a glass, then leaned against the wall, watching her as she stood looking out the window. “What are you thinking about?” he asked her after a few silent minutes.

“Just admiring the view,” she replied, smiling in his direction. “It’s beautiful. What about you?”

“Just admiring the view,” he teased, smiling back. “You’re beautiful.”

She colored slightly. “You’re sweet.”

He moved to stand behind her, resting his free hand on her shoulder. “It’s the truth.” He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to the side of her neck, making her shiver. “You are beautiful. And I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she murmured, leaning her head to the side and granting him better access to her soft skin. “I never thought I’d say it, but I do.”

He set his glass down on the desk and wrapped his arms around her, resting his forehead against the side of her neck and breathing deeply of her scent. “I hope you know that I realize every day how lucky I am to have you,” he murmured. “You are special and amazing, and my life is so much better with you in it.”

She turned in his arms, wrapping hers around his neck. “I hope you know the feeling’s mutual,” she admitted. “You’re pretty amazing yourself, you know. And even when you’re driving me crazy, I love being with you. You make me feel so much lighter… and you make me laugh so much.”

He grinned, kissing her warmly. “Come to bed,” he murmured against her lips.

“Yes,” she murmured back. She set her glass down next to his, letting him lead her into the bedroom. His hands were sliding the zipper down the back of her dress when her eyes fell on the small brown bag he’d bought at the sex shop earlier. It was sitting on his nightstand. She turned, looking at him over her shoulder. “Castle.”

He paused. She only called him that nowadays when she was irritated with him, and he was honestly confused about what he could have done between the living room and the bedroom to bring on such a state. “What?”

“What is that?” She pointed at the bag.

He blinked, then made a soft sound of understanding. “I honestly forgot that was there.” He slid her dress off her shoulders, leaning to kiss the warm skin thus revealed before lowering the fabric further so she could step out of it. He laid the dress carefully over the back of a chair and turned to her, taking her hands. “Kate… do you trust me?”

That was a loaded question, and she could feel the weight of it settling on her. Trust was many-faceted when it came to him. She trusted him with her heart; on occasion, she had trusted him with her life. He obviously had something in mind that he wanted to do with her, and the question was: did she trust him in bed?

She swallowed hard. It was really no question at all. “Yes.” She paused. “But…”

“I promise, it’s not anything exotic.” He smiled. “And if you don’t like it, you’ll never see it again. But I think you’ll like it.” He leaned down and kissed her gently. “Plus, it’ll give you a chance to laugh at me.”

She quirked an eyebrow. “And why is that?”

“Because I’m the one that wears it,” he replied, “and it looks _very_ silly.”

Now entirely intrigued, Kate let him kiss her again, shivering as his hands slid down her body, caressing her skin. His nimble fingers unclasped her bra, sliding it off, and her hands came up to rest on his shoulders as he cupped her breasts. “God, you’re beautiful.” He leaned down to kiss her throat, his lips skimming over her skin until he could take a nipple into his mouth. She gasped and arched toward him, and his hands slid down her body, his fingers hooking under the elastic of her panties and pulling them down her legs.

She let him back her up to the bed and then lay her down, and she scooted farther onto the mattress as he shucked his own clothing and then climbed up with her, covering her body with his and leaning down to kiss her breathless once more. His fingers made their way between her legs, teasing at her clit before slipping inside her to test her readiness.

She was quite wet for him already and he groaned softly as her hands stroked his back, then straightened up and reached for the bag. She watched with interest as he pulled out a box, which he opened. She felt her eyebrows climb up toward her hairline as she examined the instrument he pulled out. “What is that?”

He grinned. “It’s a cock ring.”

“I’ve seen cock rings before,” she objected. “They never looked like that.”

“It’s a different kind,” he pointed out. He handed her a remote control. “For one thing, this one vibrates.”

She flicked the remote on and, sure enough, the item in his hand began buzzing. “But what’s the thing on the top for?”

He grinned even wider, reaching down to press the bulbous protrusion between her legs, against her clit. Her breath hitched in a squeak of surprise, and then she shuddered hard. “Oh, my God.”

“Exactly.” He removed the ring. “Turn it off.”

She did so, watching as he retrieved a small bottle of lube from the bag and coated the toy liberally, then slid it onto his cock. She snickered slightly at the sight of it surrounding the base of his erection. “You were right,” she admitted. “That _does_ look silly.”

He leaned forward, pushing her down onto her back and mouthing at the base of her neck. “Oh, Kate, you’re going to love it, though.” He shifted, pressing himself into her. She groaned deeply, her breath catching when he reached between them to adjust the positioning of the bulb. Then he reached up, wrapping his hand around hers and flicking the remote control.

“Oh, my God,” she whispered again. She heard him laugh softly against her ear but didn’t care. The toy was pressed tightly between her body and his, the bulb pressed against her clit, and the vibrations were shooting through her entire body. “Oh, Christ,” she whispered. “Rick, please.”

He shifted above her, bracing his weight on his elbows, and began to thrust, pushing deep inside her. She groaned, her legs coming up almost of their own volition to wrap around his waist. Her hips strained upwards, seeking more of him and that delicious sensation, and within just a few thrusts, she was jolted into climax, arching and crying out his name. He kissed her hard, his hips still moving, and she whimpered and writhed, her arms wrapping around his shoulders and her fingernails digging into his back. She wanted to tell him how amazing it felt, how good it was; she wanted to beg him for more, plead with him to push in harder and faster and deeper – but she couldn’t get her voice to work, so she whimpered and cried out and arched toward him, her legs pulling him in tighter with every thrust.

And then he pushed into her even deeper, grinding his hips against hers, and she felt his hand cover hers and push a button on the remote control. The toy was suddenly vibrating harder, and she came again, crying out desperately. He held himself inside her, grinding but not thrusting, and just as she started to come down again, he pushed the button once more, sending the toy up into its third setting.

She wanted to scream at the sudden, mind-eating pleasure that overcame her body, but she couldn’t even manage that; her mouth was open, but the only sound that escaped was a tiny whimper and a deep, shuddering breath as her muscles seized up and her clit expanded to take over her entire body. “Oh,” she managed, repeating the sound again and again as her inner muscles spasmed around him. “Oh. Oh.”

She felt him draw himself out and thrust again, heard him whispering her name, and when she had regained control of her voice, she whispered his as well. “Oh, Rick,” she breathed, letting her breath wash across his cheek, her legs tightening around his waist again. “Come in me, Rick. I want to feel you.”

He bent his head, resting his temple against hers. “I love you,” he whispered in her ear, thrusting again. “God, I love you.” And then he came, the warm wash inside her accompanied by a deep groan from within his chest. When he was still, she switched off the vibrator, but she still held him close, buried inside her.

“That was amazing,” she whispered.

He chuckled in her ear. “I told you I thought you’d like it.”

She laughed softly as well. “You were right.”

At last, he withdrew from her, both of them shuddering at the residual sensations, and he slid the ring off, staggering on unsteady legs into the bathroom to wash it while she turned the covers down and slipped between the sheets. He returned a moment later and climbed into bed with her, pulling her against him and resting his head against hers. “Thank you.”

She looked up at him. “For…?”

“For trusting me. For being willing to go outside of your comfort zone with me.”

She smiled slightly, leaning up to kiss him. “It was worth it.”


	10. Bond

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paris is nice this time of year.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading and commenting! I hope you have enjoyed reading this story as much as I have enjoyed writing it, and I hope you will come along on my next journey - the crack!fic of doom! ^_^

He saw her the minute she walked into the room. She was wearing a green dress that hugged her curves perfectly and she was accented with diamonds that sparkled in the low light. Her hair was down and curling around her shoulders, and her makeup was dark and sultry. She scanned the room for a brief moment before making her way toward the bar where he sat. Her movements were sleek, dangerous and sexual, and he took a sip of his drink to combat his suddenly-dry mouth. She appeared next to him as if out of nowhere and gestured at the barstool. “Is this seat taken?” she asked, her Russian-accented voice low and sultry.

“In fact, it is not,” he replied, smiling slightly. “Please, have a seat.”

“Spasiba,” she replied, sliding onto the seat. The bartender drifted over to ask for her drink preference, and she pondered for a moment before saying, “Vodka. Neat.” He brought it and she raised the glass to her lips, leaving a dark half-moon print on it when she set it back down. “So,” she said to him, “you are here all alone? Handsome man as yourself?”

He gave her a slight half-grin. “Not any more,” he replied. “After all, here you are.”

She smiled slightly. “Da.” She took another sip of her drink, raising one hand and touching a fingertip to his shoulder, then drawing that touch all the way down his arm. “Will you tell me your name?”

He grinned back, resting a hand on her knee. “Will you tell me yours?”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You mean you do not already know? Mister Bond, I am... disappointed.”

She started to rise, and he caught her wrist. “I know what they call you... Nikki. But I don’t know your real name.”

“Well,” she said, studying him with hot eyes. “Perhaps you come to see me later... upstairs, da? And if we have good conversation, perhaps I tell you.” She ran that fingertip down the bridge of his nose. “Perhaps not.” She pulled away from him. “Ten-twenty-four,” she said, turning to walk away. “Do not take too long; I may grow tired and go to sleep.”

He waited five minutes after she’d left the bar - he probably should have waited longer, but he just didn’t have it in him - before he gave his room number to the bartender to charge the drinks and left, catching the elevator and taking it up to the tenth floor. It was late, and the whole building was nearly silent as he made his way down the hall, knocking quietly on the door to suite 1024. When she opened the door, he frankly gaped at her; she had changed clothes, and was now dressed in a spaghetti-strapped silver negligee that reached the floor. The bodice was gathered and cupped her breasts beautifully; the skirt was slit all the way up to the waist on both sides, exposing her gorgeous legs and her bare feet. Her hair was still down, but she’d pulled the sides back and clipped them behind her ears, giving her an air of innocence which in no way detracted from the cloud of sin which enveloped her.

“I thought you maybe changed your mind,” she said, stepping back to let him into the room.

“Never,” he replied, waiting until she’d closed the door behind him to turn and take her in his arms, pressing her against the wall. “You’re very beautiful, Nikki Heat,” he murmured against the side of her neck. “Tell me, are all KGB agents as beautiful as you are?”

She chuckled low in her throat. “I don’t know, Mr. Bond,” she replied, one hand coming up to wrap around his neck. “Are all men at MI-6 as handsome as you? Perhaps I should defect and find out, no?”

Her other hand was sliding down toward his waistband, and he caught her wrist firmly, raising it up to press it against the wall. “Where are the disks?”

She opened her eyes wide, affecting innocence. “I do not know what you mean.”

He lowered his mouth to hers, catching her lips easily, and she moaned softly when his tongue teased her lips apart and slid into her mouth. He caught her other hand, drawing it from his neck. He raised both her wrists up over her head, gripping them firmly in one hand, and let his other hand trail down to cup her breast. “Tell me where the disks are.”

“I don’t have any disks,” she protested, and he tweaked her nipple. “You are bad man, Mr. Bond.”

He chuckled softly against her lips. His mouth began making its slow way across her jaw and then down her neck. “Tell me where they are, Nikki.”

“I tell you nothing,” she replied, then gasped as he yanked on the bodice of her negligee, exposing her breasts. His lips crossed her soft flesh and he captured one nipple in his mouth, sucking gently. She gasped and moaned softly, arching toward him. He laid his other hand on her hip, holding her still, and suckled harder.

Her hands were just above her head; she stretched her fingers carefully, tossing her head back in pleasure, and then she burst into a flurry of action, snatching one of the clips from her hair and shoving him backward just far enough that she could get the edge of the clip under his chin. He could feel its razor-sharpness and he froze. She chuckled low in her throat. “You think I am stupid?” she hissed. “You think you are so charming, oh, I will faint in ecstasy and give you disks? Ha!” She used the pressure of the sharp blade to push him backward toward the chaise longue. “Now, you tell me, Mr. Bond. Where is Russian agent you intercepted in London?”

“You’d like to know, wouldn’t you?” he replied, his eyes narrowing. “But you’ll never find him.”

“I will find him.” She tossed her hair back. “I am the best.”

“I know your reputation,” he replied. “You are the best KGB agent there is.” He paused, and then he grinned darkly. “But you’re not the best in the world. That, my dear Nikki, would be me.” And a moment later, both her hair clips were in the floor across the room, and she was lying on her face on the chaise, one arm twisted up behind her back and him kneeling between her thighs. “Now,” he purred against her shoulder. “Tell me where the disks are.”

His hand slid up her leg, pushing the silver fabric slowly out of his way. She writhed. “I will say nothing!”

His hand made its way to her hip and she moaned softly, rolling her hips back against him. “You are bad, bad man, James Bond!”

He chuckled, leaning down to press a kiss to the middle of her back. “Oh, but I’ll make you feel so good,” he whispered against her skin. She whimpered, struggling slightly, and he licked her skin. “Tell me you don’t want this, and I’ll let you go.”

She whimpered, struggling weakly, and he brushed the fabric of her negligee aside, exposing her naked ass. He chuckled, running a finger down the cleft of her buttocks and between her legs. “Tell me where the disks are, and I’ll stop.”

She gasped when his fingers found her core. She was hot and wet, and they slipped easily inside her. “I tell you nothing!” she declared again, and he stretched, kissing the side of her neck even as his fingers slid deep inside her.

“You’re so wet, Nikki,” he whispered against her ear. “I think you want this.” He began to stroke his fingers in and out of her. She rolled her hips back against him, whimpering again, and he chuckled, leaning to nip at her earlobe. “Tell me where the disks are.”

“Jesus Christ, Rick,” she moaned. “Would you stop writing the damn story and fuck me already?”

He released her arm, laughing, and brushed her hair aside, kissing the back of her neck. “Yes,” he whispered. He reached down between their bodies and unfastened his pants, pushing them down around his knees. Taking himself in hand, Rick guided himself to the warm wetness between her legs and they both moaned softly as he pushed himself inside her. “Oh, God, Kate,” he whispered. “Oh, you feel so good.”

“Fuck me,” she whispered. “Please, Rick.”

He had other ideas. He was straddling the long end of the chaise with her body stretched out along its length; holding her hips to keep from sliding out of her, he carefully sat down. “Sit up,” he said, sliding his hands up her torso to help her straighten her body.

A moment later, she was upright, sitting on his lap with her back to him, still impaled by his cock. “Oh, God,” she whispered, leaning back against his chest. “Oh, that’s so good.” He felt amazing, buried in her like that; the angle pressed him against the hypersensitive front wall of her channel and the position made it feel like he was deeper inside her than he’d ever been before. “Oh, God, Rick.”

He chuckled, one hand wrapping around her stomach while the other slid under the silver fabric, snaking between her legs and finding her clit with ease. She cried out when he circled the little nub, and her body shuddered in his arms. He chuckled softly, kissing the side of her neck, and applied his fingers firmly, stroking and rubbing her clit until, with a cry, she came, her body convulsing and her pussy clamping down around his cock.

He waited until her shaking eased, then he pushed her forward again, standing and raising one leg up to kneel on the chaise. She did the same, her leg resting along the outside of his, and she planted her palms on the chaise cushion, bracing her torso as he started to thrust. The sensations were amazing, and she closed her eyes to revel in them, her voice crying out in pleasure with every press of his cock into her body.

He was grunting with effort, slamming into her hard, and he reached one hand under her hip, curling it against her clit again. She wailed when she came this time, and he groaned her name, spilling inside her. They both slumped onto the leather for a moment, breathing hard, and then he slowly removed himself from her, breathing deeply. He drew her into his arms and sat down again, holding her close. “Oh, God,” he murmured against her temple. “That was amazing.”  
She snuggled against him. “Yes, it was.” She held him tight for a long moment, then stood, sliding off his lap and holding one hand out to him. “Come on.”  
He took her hand, following her into the bedroom, and they shucked their clothing, slipping into the bed together and cuddling close. There was silence for a long few minutes before she spoke. “Okay, I think I have to say that French sex is far superior to British sex.”

“Of course it is,” he replied, grinning broadly. “It’s French.”

She laughed, snuggling even closer against him. “Does it actually count as French sex, though?” she wondered sleepily. “I was Russian.”

“Hmm,” he replied, stroking her hair. “I don’t know. Tell you what; we’ll try again tomorrow, and you can be French. Then we’ll decide.”

She laughed softly. “My French accent is awful.” then she yawned. “What’s on the agenda for tomorrow?”

“Book signing early,” he replied. “Then I was thinking Eiffel Tower and food. Not necessarily in that order.”

“And the Louvre?”

“And the Louvre.” He leaned a bit, kissing her temple. “Sleep now.”

“Okay,” she said softly. “Love you.”

“Love you, too,” he whispered, but she was already gone.

When she woke the next morning, he was gone already; the bedside clock read almost eleven and she laughed, stretching luxuriously. She was becoming a complete hedonist on this trip, and getting back into work mode once she got back to New York was going to be a bitch and a half. She didn’t mind; it was worth it. She hadn’t felt this relaxed in years. She rolled out of bed, retrieved her book and padded into the bathroom. She filled the tub with hot water and bubbles and sank into it, cheerfully losing herself in the book until the water started to turn cold. She was half-dressed and putting on her makeup when the door to the suite opened and he came in, rubbing his hand.

“Hey,” he greeted her, coming into the bathroom and wrapping his arms around her waist. He pressed a kiss to her shoulder. “How was your morning?”

“Virtually nonexistent,” she replied, smiling at him in the mirror. “I’ve only been up for an hour or so. How was yours?”

“Busy,” he replied. “As usual.” He leaned into the crook of her neck, breathing deeply. “God, you always smell so good.”

She smiled. “The better to keep your attention,” she teased. He laughed, swatting at her butt on his way out into the main suite. “I’ll be ready to leave in just a few.”

“No hurry,” he replied. “The food will still be there.”

They wandered toward the Eiffel Tower on foot, since it was so close to their hotel, and stopped to eat in a little cafe in the shadow of the monument. “It’s really beautiful,” Kate commented, looking up at the structure from where they sat.

“Wait till you see the view from the top,” he told her. “It’s breathtaking.”

As expected, the place was full of tourists, so they had to wait their turn to go up in the elevator to the top of the tower. It was worth the wait, though; the view was amazing, as Castle had predicted, and Kate stood at the railing for a long time, looking out over the city and appreciating the beauty. He stood behind her, his arms wrapped around her and his chin resting on her shoulder. After a time, he shifted, brushing her hair aside and pressing a kiss to the nape of her neck. “I love you,” he murmured.

She turned slightly, smiling softly at him. “I love you, too.”

He kissed her lips briefly, and she turned back to look at the view again. He let go of her with his right arm for a moment, shifting, and then he brought it back around her again. “Kate,” he said softly, “I have to ask you something.”

“Sure,” she said, leaning back against him. “What?”

He held her tightly for a long moment, not speaking, and then he took a deep breath and she felt his demeanor grow very serious. “We’ve known each other for what, two years now? Two and a half?”

“Something like that,” she replied, feeling her brow furrow. What was he after?

“And we’ve been together for almost six months,” he continued, “but to me... it feels like we’ve always been together. And Kate... you have to know that I’ve been happier these last six months than I ever have before.”

Suspicion began to dawn in her mind. She tried to turn, but he held her tightly, keeping her still. “Rick,” she murmured. “What are you doing?”

“I think you know what I’m doing,” he replied. His hands had been clasped together in front of her waist; he raised them now to the level of her chest and opened them. In his palm rested a small black velvet box. As he opened it, he spoke. “Kate, I want to marry you.”

Her hands came up to cover her mouth in shock at the sight of the ring in his hands. It was deceptively simple and stunningly beautiful; a single round-cut solitaire on a diamond-encrusted band, and it had to have cost him an absolutely ridiculous amount of money. “Rick,” she whispered.

“Please,” he murmured into her ear. “Please say yes.”

She felt the tears fill her eyes and begin to fall, and she turned in his grip, her arms going up and around his neck. “You are aware that proposing at the top of the Eiffel Tower is the most ridiculous romance movie cliche of all time.”

He grinned. “I know. Isn’t it great?”

She laughed, pulling him down and kissing him warmly. “Yes.”

His arms tightened around her, pulling her hard against him, and he buried his face in the side of her neck. “God, I love you,” he whispered against her skin. Then he let her go, taking her left hand and sliding the ring onto her trembling finger, his own hands just as unsteady. Once it was on, he raised her hand to his lips, kissing her palm, and then he drew her against him again and kissed her warmly.

They broke apart at the sound of applause, both of them looking around in surprise. Kate flushed bright red when she realized that their private, romantic moment had not only just been witnessed but also filmed and photographed by at least thirty people. “Oh, my God,” she moaned softly. “Castle, I’m going to kill you.”

“Wait till after the ceremony,” he advised her. “That way you get all the life insurance.”

As they made their way toward the elevator, a young man with a German accent stopped them. “I have film for you,” he said, offering Kate a slip of paper. “You email me, ja? I send you. You have it, show your family, friends.”

Kate took the paper, still blushing, but she smiled. “Danke,” she told him softly. “I will.”

The young man grinned, shook Castle’s hand, and turned away again, returning to his camera. Rick and Kate escaped down the elevator and into the sunny afternoon.

He took her to the Louvre, as promised, and then up to Montmartre. As the sun went down, they headed back toward their hotel, where they were meeting Paula for dinner. She was already there when they arrived, and the maitre d’ led them into the dining room toward her table. As they came around a divider, Castle gave a soft groan. “Oh, no.”

Kate looked up at him. “What?”

“Gina made it.”

Kate turned back toward the table they were being led to. Sitting next to Paula was a fairly attractive blonde woman in a gold dress. She was watching them with an unreadable expression, but she smiled when they arrived at the table. “Richard.” She nodded at Rick, then turned her eyes to Kate. “And you must be Detective Beckett.”

“Kate,” Kate replied, offering her hand. Gina took it, shaking it briefly, and Rick pulled a chair out for Kate, who sat. He then seated himself, looking pained. “Gina, I thought you weren’t going to make it.”

“Yes, well, everything fell into place at the last minute,” Gina replied.

Paula rolled her eyes, and Kate’s lips twitched as she fought not to grin. She picked up her menu, and Paula gasped. “Rick, you didn’t!” She reached out, grasping Kate’s left hand and pulling it toward her. “Holy crap, Rick, how much did that set you back?”

“Not enough,” Rick replied, his eyes on Gina’s face. His ex-wife was watching Paula examine Kate’s ring with an odd expression. She seemed to feel his scrutiny, though, and looked up at him. He quirked an eyebrow.

Gina smirked slightly. “What’s the matter, Rick? Afraid I’ll say something to spoil your fun?”

“He’s probably afraid you’re going to say something to deliberately be divisive,” Kate interrupted, retrieving her hand from Paula and going back to her menu, seemingly uninterested in Gina. “He knows I’m likely to pull a gun if you try, so he’s probably trying to warn you that you shouldn’t cross me.”

Gina studied Kate’s face for a long moment, then smiled tightly. “Congratulations,” she said simply, picking up her own menu. Dinner was a very quiet affair after that.

Once it was over, Rick took Kate’s hand and they said their goodnights, escaping into the elevator and riding up to their room, his arm around her shoulders and her body snuggled close against his. She held out her left hand, looking at the ring. “You keep doing that,” he commented. “Is it that pretty?”

She chuckled. “It’s hard to believe this is real,” she admitted as he unlocked the door of their room. “I keep thinking I’m going to wake up in just a second and realize I’ve fallen asleep at my desk or something.”

He pushed the door shut, then took her in his arms and kissed her. “It’s real,” he murmured against her skin. “I promise.”

She kissed him back, then released his lips. She took a firm grip on his lapels, looking up at him and giving him her most wicked grin. “So, Monsieur Bond,” she said, in a terrible French accent. “We meet again, oui?”

\--The End--

_Note: Thank you all for reading and commenting! I hope you have enjoyed reading this story as much as I have enjoyed writing it, and I hope you will come along on my next journey - the crack!fic of doom! ^_^_


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